Pertinacity
by Caligo Origuu
Summary: They fought long and hard to save their world, but it was over. The veil was gone; the world as she knew it was lost. But then again, it was hardly the first time she'd managed the impossible. She just needed one more miracle. (Time-travel fic/Female Inquisitor) SPOILER WARNING FOR THE TRESPASSER DLC
1. Prologue - The World Before

**SPOILER WARNING FOR ALL DRAGON AGE GAMES AND INQUISITION ADD-ONS, ESPECIALLY THE TRESPASSER DLC!**

Summary: They fought long and hard to save their world, but it was over. The Veil was gone; the world as she knew it was lost. But then again, it was hardly the first time she'd managed the impossible. She just needed one more miracle. (Time-travel fic)

* * *

The World Before

* * *

"I was kind of hoping I'd never have to come back here," Varric said. Iron Bull grunted an agreement, the tension in his grip on his massive axe the only evidence of how unnerved he really was by the fact that they were so near the Fade.

They might complain on occasion, but they had never hesitated to follow Bethana into crazy, illogical, magic filled places- not when she was the Herald, not when she was the Inquisitor, and not even after she'd lost the title. She hoped that they knew just how much she treasured that loyalty.

"I wish it hadn't come to this," she said as they picked their way carefully through the rubble, watching for traps. "But I'm glad you're with me all the same.

"Ah, Starshine, don't go getting sentimental on us now. I'm going to get all teary-eyed," Varric chided.

"Maker-forbid," Cassandra said dryly.

As they quietly sniped back and forth, Cullen's hand slipped briefly into hers and squeezed. She glanced over in time to catch a brief, warm smile that did as much as the others' good-natured bickering to ease the weight of trepidation lodged in her chest. Determination rose to take its place. _They_ were the reason she had to stop Solas. She'd do anything to keep her friends safe.

Officially the Inquisition was disbanded. The soldiers and scouts went home. The scribes and clerics returned to the Chantry. The wardens moved on. The mages reformed the Circles and Colleges under their own rule. Skyhold was all but empty. Officially.

Unofficially Bethana- the former Inquisitor- and her closest companions had begun a desperate search for Solas and some way to keep him from tearing down the Veil and returning the world to the way it had been when the elves were Immortal. He'd warned them himself that the return of his world would mean the end of theirs.

Months of searching- with Solas' growing flock of elven zealots doing their best to block them at every turn had led them to a shattered eluvian from Kirkwall that Varric had been decidedly unhappy to see. It had taken them even longer to fix the blasted thing, and by the time they managed it Bethana was unwilling to wait for the rest of their companions and allies to return from the various missions that had scattered them across Thedas.

They were nearly out of time; she could feel the end growing closer with every night she dreamed. The spirits were restless with the near inevitability of it. Bethana rushed through the shimmering silver of the mirror with only Cullen, Varric, Cassandra, the Iron Bull and a couple dozen others, into the fragmented world that existed between Thedas and the Fade.

Their small army found themselves in a massive ruin with a maze of walls and walkways that were alternatively pristine, crumbling, and floating in chunks on their sides or upside down.

They made their way with suspicious ease through the ruin. None of the others seemed to notice, but Bethana could feel the fade magic that was part of the very air around them swirling gently in the same direction they were going and tugging her with it. It wasn't a strong pull- like standing in the mild whirlpool of a bath after the plug had been removed. She could have fought it, but she was certain that in the center of that whirlpool they would find the very elf they were searching for.

"Is anyone else unnerved that we haven't run into any of the crazy elves that follow Chuckles around these days?" Varric asked a short while later. "I expected this place to be crawling with them."

"You think we're walking into a trap?" Cullen asked, not sounding terribly surprised.

"I think Chuckles would be more surprised if we _didn't_ show up than if we do," Varric said.

"We don't have any choice," Cassandra said tersely.

"I know, I know. I'm just saying..."

"We'll have to watch our backs," Iron Bull finished for him. Varric nodded.

They all grew more tense the further they walked without any interference. Bethana caught an occasional glimpse of one spirit or another from the corner of her eye- something that always made her nightmare-harassed husband flinch just a little. She stuck close to Cullen, thought she knew he could handle a fight with demons without losing his focus if it came to that. It never did. The spirits left them alone.

They came at last to a large courtyard at the middle of the ruin. They were all jumpy and on edge as they crept closer. The air all around them was charged with green fade magic swirling slowly in a gentle current towards the fountain in the center of the wildly overgrown garden. At the very top of the fountain perched a round globe on a pedestal: one of the elven artifacts that Solas had claimed strengthened the Veil.

The implied manipulation hit Bethana so strongly that she hardly noticed at first that Solas himself was standing in front of it. She'd helped him activate those artifacts all over Thedas. If that was how he intended to tear down the Veil... Had she been helping him destroy the world all along?

The low string of expletives from Varric echoed her feelings pretty accurately.

"Solas!" Cassandra spat, stalking forward with all of the pent up fury that Bethana had watched her try to control over the last year. "Traitor!"

Bethana hurried after her and grabbed her friend before Cassandra could lunge at the elf, her head full of memories of Qunari turned to stone.

"Don't do this," Bethana pleaded as Solas paused in the motion of reaching for the artifact. She could hear the quiet scuffle of steps as the others spread out behind her, but she didn't look away from the elven legend who had- she'd thought- become her friend. "There are other ways to help your people, to rebuild this place. There _has_ to be."

"I thought you were better than this, Chuckles," Varric joined in. His voice was light and a little coaxing, but Bethana caught sight of his grip shifting on Biana from the corner of her eye and knew he was weighing his chances. "I knew the guy who started the mage war, you know. He thought he had to hurt people to accomplish his 'greater purpose' too. Didn't work out so well for him."

Solas went perfectly still and for a fraction of a second she thought they could get through to him, but then he turned around. His eyes were full of sorrow, but they were calm. Distant and determined. Even standing right in front of them he was impossibly out of reach.

The others must have realized the same because there was a sudden rise in the tension around her. The Iron Bull shifted forward just a fraction, and in the split second that Solas' gaze turned towards the Qunari, Bianca fired. Varric wasn't pulling his punches, the arrow flew with deadly accuracy towards Solas's heart-

And stopped mere inches away, hovering in midair. Varric cursed as Solas' expression hardened and he waved a hand towards their little army. Bethana and the handful of other mages with her threw up a desperate shield. She'd warned them about the way he'd turned the Qunari to stone; they were as prepared as they could be, though she wasn't sure that would matter in the end.

Solas' magic slammed into theirs and the shield immediately began to crack and buckled. Bethana felt like she was deep underwater, slowly being crushed by the pressure. She'd known he must have gotten his powers back, but _this..._ This was not the Solas that she fought and bled and won the war beside. This Solas could have crushed Coypheus and his dragon all on his own.

They weren't going to win. Bethana knew it even as her companions took advantage of Solas' brief surprise in the face of their shield and attacked all at once, arrows flying, weapons swinging. Solas flicked his fingers and his magic snapped at their shield. The spell shattered, and the recoil knocked the mages off their feet. Bethana could only lay there, stunned, trying to catch her breath- trying not to believe they'd lost already even as cold horror wrapped around her heart.

When her ears stopped ringing she was met with silence. There were no battle cries, no clang of weapons on armor, no woosh and crackle of spells; there was only the faint whisper of magic from the artifact and the trickle of water from the fountain.

"Maker no," she breathed. _Please_. She had to fight against the dread to make herself sit up and look. A pained cry caught in her throat when she was met with Cullen's back standing between her and Solas, still as stone.

"No," she said again. "No, _no_. Cullen-" She reached for him, scrambling to her feet, and found cold, lifeless granite beneath her fingertips. "Please." Her vision blurred with tears. She pushed magic into the stone, but there was no lingering spell to disrupt and nothing to heal. He was gone. They were all gone. Everyone who had followed her so faithfully through the mirror stood as statues around her, weapons raised, expressions frozen in determination. In the midst of her heartbreak it didn't occur to her at the time to wonder why she wasn't the same.

"I'm sorry."

The sad sincerity in Solas' words slipped right past the grief threatening to overwhelm Bethana to spark something deeper, primal inside her: _rage_.

Bethana gave a furious scream as she ducked around Cullen's statue to fling herself at Solas. It was pointless, but she was beyond caring. She wanted to hurt him. She wanted to kill him. Fire and lightning rose to her call with more ease and power than they ever had in Thedas. Still he brushed off every spell as though they were no more than bits of breeze.

"Change them back!" Bethana demanded.

"It's too late," Solas said, turning back to touch the artifact with slender fingers. It brightened. "It's already over."

"We _**trusted**_ you!" Bethana swung the spiked sun of her staff at his head, unsurprised when it glanced off his shield without effect. He met her gaze as she stood there trembling with anger and grief. His eyes were calm, sad but resigned the way he'd been when he'd helped Wisdom to a peaceful end. He was grieving her already, but that wouldn't change his course.

The green of the Fade began to leak into reality. A tremor went through the air as the Veil cracked under the pressure of the artifacts' magic.

Solas' quiet, "I know," was the last thing she heard. Then the Fade washed the world away and Bethana with it.


	2. The World Between - Victory

The World Between:

Victory

* * *

It had taken a great deal of sacrifice and effort, but Solas had gotten what he wanted. The Veil was gone, washed away as though it had never been, and his home once again stood whole and proud amidst the undiluted magic that flowed as freely as the spirits between the Fade, the "real" world, and the place between. He had woken the rest of the Evanuris and striped them of their magic before they could ruin what he had rebuilt. His elven followers, fade-touched by his own hand to help them survive the transition, roamed through the libraries and palaces, eager to learn and utterly free. They mingled with the spirits peacefully- if with a lingering, wary reluctance that made him miss the most open-minded of his acquaintances. All in all, his plans had gone exceptionally well. It should have made him happy.

Perhaps he hadn't been as prepared for what victory would cost him as he'd thought.

The Inquisition, though it had given up its armies and officially disbanded, had been an unexpectedly poignant adversary. They had fought long and hard- not to kill him but to bring him back into the fold. None had fought harder than the Inquisitor herself. Solas that she had believed that she could reach him right up until the moment he turned her companions to stone. The most painful irony was that her belief in his friendship might have been the only reason he had succeeded. She'd been unwilling to seek his death until it was too late.

He wasn't sure he liked what it said about him that he was willing to make the sacrifice that she had not.

There was little point in entertaining regrets; he had replaced her world with his, and there was no going back. She was gone. They were all gone, aside from his students and those who had been trapped sleeping in the fade. It had been necessary. He had set the world right once more, fixed what he had broken. It had been _necessary_.

Solas frowned at the direction his thoughts took every time he went wandering the ramparts of the massive library alone.

"Perhaps I had best return to my students," he mused aloud, trying to ignore the slight ache in his chest that there was no one there to answer. He'd gotten used to sarcastic quips from Varric, or questions from Cole, or sly humor from the Inquisitor somewhere along the way. Brushing the memories aside was not as simple as he had once imagined it would be. He shook his head. The memories would fade. "There is still work to be done. They have much to learn."

Had he stayed he might have seen the flickers of red light just outside the city walls where elven-made walls gave way to the hazier plains of the natural Fade. Had he stayed he might have been able to stop them in time.

Still lost in thought, Solas turned around and went inside.


	3. The World Between - Compassion

In the World Between:

Compassion

* * *

Cole had been happy- really, _truly_ happy to the depths of his spirit at the side of his bard. Maryden was kind and sweet and caring, and he liked being with her. She helped people with her songs, with her strong voice and her warm smile. She helped _him._ He wasn't sure whether spirits could love the way mortals loved, but some days she made him wonder.

Then Solas- his _friend_ , accepting and seeking and sad for reasons he hadn't understood until it was too late and Solas was lost to them- broke down the Veil and the world that Cole had fought so hard to understand, the world he had began to treasure ended. Just like that, Maryden was gone. Lost. Dead. Cole was lost too for a time, but before he had been Cole, he'd been a spirit. When the Fade washed over the world like an ocean held back too long by a dam, he didn't drown. He lost the humanity that he had pieced together with the help of Varric and Bethana and Maryden, and he became a spirit again. He wasn't Cole any longer; he was Compassion.

He didn't feel like Compassion though. He felt like grief. He felt like the moment in cupboard on the bad day when all the hurt rushed out of the boy in a wave of fire. He felt like the day when he had found the Templar who had left the boy to starve. He felt like the moment the boy had died in that gloomy cell while he hovered next to him, so caught up in the despair and utter helplessness that he lost himself completely and became the boy instead.

They were all gone: Maryden and Varric and Bethana, all of them. They were gone and he was lost and alone all over again.

Compassion wandered the edges of the new world listlessly, paying no mind to what Solas or any of the other surviving elves were doing. He didn't care. He was angry but still enough himself to fear becoming the demon he would have to be to try to kill Solas, so he avoided thoughts of his former friend.

It took him longer than it should have to realize that someone was following him, but one day he turned around to retrace his path and found himself face to face with another spirit. There was something familiar...

"Faith," he whispered in muted surprise when the memory stirred at last. The other spirit had resided within Rhys' mother for a time, keeping her alive, and then had been transferred to Rhys' beloved to save her life in turn. He'd never met her outside of one host or the other, but she, like him, had been trying to help. She'd done a much better job of it in the beginning.

"Compassion," she acknowledged, her voice stronger, calmer. She hovered taller than him, her bearing less slouched with despair. On the other hand, she had been following him, so perhaps she was more lost than she appeared.

"Evangeline is gone," Compassion realized. He winced. That meant Rhys was gone too. There was no one else left.

"Yes," Faith said quietly. "She could not survive the change. I was..." She trailed off, and Compassion waited patiently. He couldn't feel her pain the way he could the mortals- they felt things so fiercely- but he'd learned enough to see that she was hurt in her own way. "I saw you and remembered you. I would rather not be... alone. You are familiar."

He nodded and said no more because there was nothing else that needed to be said. They wandered together for a time in silence. Time passed, he wasn't sure how much; it didn't seem to matter.

It was a quiet, familiar whisper in his heart that changed everything. Compassion stopped and Faith stopped with him.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Someone else's pain." He couldn't quite make out who or what was hurting, but the need to find the source, to _help_ was overwhelming. He hurried off, for once glad for his spirit form that could fly as he sought out the tugging in his heart.

 _Grief. Betrayal. Anger._ _Pain_.

He found the source of the ache quickly. A fragmented shell of a spirit flickered in and out of being in the shifting shadows beneath a small tree. It was a pale purple- an odd color for a spirit- and so damaged that he wasn't sure how it was holding onto its existence at all. The longing within it flared brighter when he stopped nearby, and he soothed it as best he could.

"It's all right. I'm here to help. We're here to help," he amended as he felt Faith hovering behind him. "My name is Col- Compassion. I-" He sought out the source of its pain as he spoke, reaching out even as it reached for him. What he found was a nearly perfect reflection of his own pain- the loss of their world, their love, the betrayal of a friend- but so bright and fierce and _mortal..._ and more than that: familiar. "I know you. I _know_ \- Bethana _?_ "

He could feel the truth inside her even though she was too broken to voice it. Panic and relief, hope and pain at the state of her all rushed through him at once. It left him shaken and nearly frantic, but it washed away the hopeless sense of being lost in return. She had belonged to the mortal world, but she had belonged to the Fade too ever since she made the mark her own. The flood of magic and Fade had broken her but not destroyed her completely. If they could find all the pieces-

"Help me," Compassion demanded, pleaded. "We have to find her. We have to fix her." There was no thought of consequences, only the driving, desperate need to save a friend.

Faith needed purpose; she nodded, and the pair of them began the painstaking search for every fragment of the woman who had been the Inquisitor. With as much gentle determination as they could muster, they wove the ragged pieces back together until her spirit lay whole- though still healing- between them. As the last threads slipped into place, a solid, physical body formed around it. The spirit remembered being human, being mortal with such certainty that the Fade bent to her perception of reality and made it so.

He was more Cole than Compassion when faced with his friend. His patience gave out, and no sooner was she whole than he was trying to wake her.

"Bethana," he prodded. "Bethana?"

It wasn't until her violet eyes opened and immediately filled with tears that he stopped to wonder whether he should have let her sleep.


	4. The World Between - Despair

The World Between:

Despair

* * *

There was always a moment between dreaming and waking where truth seemed hazy, malleable, where her mind could not be certain whether she was entering reality or leaving it. The moment the Fade flooded over the earth, Bethana was stuck there in that in-between, unable to move on, unable to go back, trapped for an eternity between destruction and existence- stuck in that moment of betrayal and pain and anger.

Then someone pieced her back together- all but the missing bits of her heart that would always belong to those she'd loved. When she was whole enough to know she had eyes, she opened them. And she remembered.

Her friends were gone. Her love was gone. There in the Fade where emotion and memory were tangible things, her grief and hurt broke her and broke free.

The sudden maelstrom of pain and rage was as unsettling and dangerous as the breach had ever been in Thedas. Solas felt the disturbance from the other side of the city. Alarm jerked him out of the chair in his study and sent him racing out of the library.

"Where are you-?" one of his students tried to ask as he ran past.

"Stay here!" was his only reply. It was one he had to had to repeat several times over when he nearly ran into other elves. They all listened to his snapped order. He couldn't help but think that his fri- allies in the Inquisition wouldn't have let him go alone regardless.

It was a long to run even with magic helping him along. By the time Solas left the city gates and made his way around the western wall, he was breathing hard and a little light-headed. It took him more than a moment to wrap his head around what he was seeing.

"Impossible," he whispered.

Around a hunched figure magic swirled out of control, crackling with rage. Crimson lightning flashed out of the storm and tore a furrow in the ground that quickly filled with red-tinted ice that bore an unfortunate resemblance to red lyrium. Perhaps it seemed fitting to her subconscious to create something she equated with destruction. Jagged shards of it jutting out of the ground in all directions. A dozen or so spirits had either been unfortunate enough to get caught up in her grief- tainted by it and turned into wailing wraiths- or they'd been born from it. They whipped around her in a tornado-like frenzy.

There on her knees at the center of the storm, almost unrecognizable, was Bethana. She'd curled in on herself, her hands knotted in her hair. Her face was hidden by her arms, but her despair would have been easy to read in her posture even if it hadn't been so thick in the air that Solas could taste it.

He might have stood for an age staring in silent regret at what she'd become if Compassion hadn't floated near enough to speak.

"She didn't think you'd do it in the end. She thought she could convince you not to. She thought friendship would be enough to change your mind." The light green spirit wasn't Cole any longer, not really, though there was something painfully familiar about the silhouette of his hat. "I thought so too."

Solas couldn't stop his minute flinch. "Col- Compassion-"

"She believed in you," the pale gold spirit beside him added softly, its voice distinctly female.

 _Faith,_ Solas thought with an odd sort of ache in his chest. _A fitting companion for the Inquisitor- though perhaps not anymore_.

"Evangeline is gone," Faith said.

"And Rhys. Maryden-" Compassion added, sounding as lost as Solas had ever heard him. Distraught. That sent fear shivering through Solas' veins; if the spirit gave into darker emotions he would become a demon. "I lost Maryden. It _hurts_. Varric's gone too. He didn't belong in the Fade. The Iron Bull and Dorian and Leliana and Josephine and Cul-" His anxiety-fueled recitation of losses was cut off by the sudden surge of sound from the corrupted spirits in the whirlwind, an inhuman wailing that almost entirely drowned out the anguished moan from the figure at the center of the storm.

Solas flinched again and clenched his jaw to control the reaction.

"She loved them," Compassion said with growing anger. "She loved them and you took them away- erased them like they never mattered at all." The spirit wrung his hands- such a human gesture. "I don't know how to help. I don't think I can make this better."

"I didn't intend..." Solas started. His voice reached Bethana where Compassion's hadn't. The storm stopped- not calm, but _still_ as every spirit and the woman in the middle turned the full intensity of their attention on the cause of all their pain.


	5. The World Between - Hope

The World Between:

Hope

* * *

"I didn't intend..." Solas started. His voice reached Bethana where Compassion's hadn't. The storm stopped- not calm, but _still_ as every spirit and the woman in the middle turned the full intensity of their attention on the cause of all their pain. It was a little unnerving, even for the Dread Wolf.

"I didn't intend to cause you pain," he finished heavily, refraining from calling her lethallan though he wanted to. He hated to see her in such a state, but the fact that she had survived the transition at all sparked lighter emotions that he ought to have buried. He'd missed her. His success had been bittersweet and even with his home returned to what it was meant to be, even surrounded by the elves who had helped him, he couldn't help feeling rather... alone.

He was fairly certain that she had _not_ missed him.

"You _intended_ to kill me, just like everyone else," Bethana spat, her hoarse voice filled with the sort of disdain he had only ever heard her direct at Corypheus.

"Their deaths were painless, an unfortunate necessity." The warning rumble of the ground beneath him as her magic lashed out made him briefly rethink the wisdom of his words. It was true though. Solas' words were calm, but he couldn't help the slight plea for understanding that slipped through. "I had to set things right." And however much he'd hated losing the few humans and dwarves who had shown true potential, the vast majority had been a curse upon his people. He did not regret their loss, though he hadn't wanted them to suffer.

"That's crap," Bethana growled, the sound echoed by all the spirits around her as rage twisted her tear-stained expression. Beside him Compassion gave a quiet whine of distress. "You could have stayed, looked for ways to make the world better _with_ us, looked for ways to heal what you could in the Fade and protect the elves. We would have helped you. All those people, people we fought _so_ hard to save, people who fought beside us, families with futures, our friends _-_ You didn't _have_ to do anything. You _chose_ to wipe out our world and make your own."

"Did you not once do something similar?" Solas asked stiffly. "You experienced a future where the world went down the wrong path. In order to fix things you had to erase that world."

"One year. I erased _one_ year," Bethana said. "My changing things didn't erase countless generations."

"But wouldn't you have done the same if that world you saw was centuries in the future?"

She all but snarled at him, then he saw uncertainty creep slowly into her eyes. "I don't... That world was awful. Dying-"

"So was yours, in its way," he said.

"If I'd made friends in that future, if I'd seen people worth fighting for-" She started off with a familiar sort of pained determination that had all too often shown up just before she offered her own well being for the 'greater good', but then that melted into an expression he couldn't quite read. It made him uneasy and the spirits around her began to stir, suddenly restless rather than purely angry. Faith and Compassion began to perk up a little, losing some of their listlessness to interest. "You're asking if I'd destroy one world for another. If I could go back in time and stop a ruined world from being created... No one would even have to die, they'd just still be sleeping..."

Solas stiffened in alarm, but his tone- mostly- maintained its even keel. "That is impossible, even here."

"Is it?" she asked, a sudden, wild hope lighting her eyes. Desperation had always made her reckless and dangerous and strong. "Didn't you once suggest that in a world without the Veil separate us from the Fade, the only limits to what magic could do were the limits of our imaginations? Memories are almost real here, and I remember quite clearly the way that magic felt, the portal, the pendant, the spell that they used..." As she spoke she reached out to the open air and Solas watched in dismay as the magic around them began to coalesce at her fingertips in a reasonable approximation of Alexius' time-traveling pendant.

"No-" he objected. He lashed out with his magic to destroy it, to stop her, but the spirits around her all flew at his face at once, and he couldn't reach her in time. He saw Compassion and Faith rush forward unhindered. He had the briefest of moments to consider the irony of her destroying the world he'd worked so hard to regain in order to save hers. Then her hand closed around the pendant, and she ripped a hole through time that swallowed the world.


	6. Ferelden - One Step Forward

Ferelden:

One Step Forward, Ten Years Back

* * *

"Ow..." Bethana's whole body throbbed with dull but persistent pain as though she'd bruised the spirit within. _Magic backlash?_ she thought, her muddled mind trying to make sense of it all. _Did I over do it? Was I practicing without supervision? The templars are supposed to-_ But templars made her think of **her** templar- former templar- and the rest of her memories came fast on the heels of that trigger. _Cullen. Corypheus. Solas._

Violet eyes fluttered open. She winced at the brightness of the sun- the very **real** sun that was so different from the gentle, hazy glow of the light in the fade-touched in-between world Solas had recreated. Hope took a stronger hold.

 _Did it work? Am I-? Where-when am I?_ Bethana squinted at her surroundings, a little dismayed to find herself alone in woods that she didn't immediately recognize. Her fingers flexed against the ground- all ten of them.

"Well, I have both hands at least," she said aloud. That was a relief. She'd gone back before Solas had been forced to cut off her lower arm to keep the mark from pulling her apart. She reached tentatively for the fade and breathed a little easier when she hit the Veil instead, though it seemed to respond a little more eagerly than she remembered it doing when she was younger. "But how much younger am I?" she asked.

She could have kept her thoughts to herself, but it was too quiet. There was the sound of rustling leaves and an occasional chirp from a bird, but was used to company. "I'm not marked, but I'm obviously not in the Circle either. Even after the war started I was usually with somebody." Her head ached and she pressed her hands over her eyes to block out the sun as she tried to force her sluggish mind to **think**. It was surprisingly difficult to do; her thoughts, her arms, and her whole body felt impossibly heavy.

"If this is before the conclave... can I stop that from happening? Should I? I could save a lot of people if I could figure out how to stop Corypheus. Of course I could also get myself killed or prompt Solas to try to end the world a lot sooner or..." There were so many ways for things to go wrong. She hadn't considered any of them before she'd activated that amulet. She wasn't sure that there was any risk that would have kept her from doing it anyways. If she'd really gone back and time and wasn't just living some sort of fade-fueled delusion, the others were all alive. _**Cullen**_ was alive.

"None of which helps me with where and when I am now, of course," she muttered. Exhausted from the magic it had taken to create the amulet, let alone activate it, even the nagging sense of urgency she felt couldn't keep her awake for long. Bethana had only just begun trying to convince herself to stand before fatigue washed over her and sleep dragged her under.

The first wisps of a dream had barely taken hold when her attention was pulled away by two presences too strong, too clear to be products of her imagination. She knew she was dreaming in the Fade, and she wondered if she could... A gentle nudge of her magic made the dream shimmer and dissolve. Bethana was left standing in a faintly hazy replica of the woods where she'd fallen asleep, the two presences beside her- one so familiar her heart gave a leap.

"Cole!" she exclaimed. She hadn't touched him much over the course of their friendship. In the past she'd worried that the contact might make it more difficult for him, that he might hear or feel too much, and as she was usually tempted to take his hand when he was already nearly frantic she hadn't wanted to risk it. This time she couldn't help herself. She threw her arms around the young man- spirit- and had only a moment to wonder whether he was the Cole she knew before his arms came up to carefully return the embrace.

"You're here," she said, pulling back to get a better look at him. He was a bit too indistinct to be human, a bit too solid to be a spirit, but he smiled very slightly and nothing else mattered because she could see that he was the Cole she knew. "Did you follow me through the portal?" A sudden flare of worry her made her wince. "Did Solas?"

"Solas is... sleeping, still," Cole answered helpfully. She relaxed. "But I am not here, not where you are. I was in the fade again when time went backwards, but I felt you dreaming. I came to find you." He frowned just a little and looked down at himself. "I am not really Cole either, not yet, maybe not ever, but I remember being Cole."

He looked a little lost and it tugged on her heart like it always did, but she only smiled and said, "You are my friend, no matter what your name is. Would you rather I called you Compassion?"

"I... don't know. Cole- the boy, the mage- he is alive now. Again. I can hear him dreaming."

"Oh," she said. "I hadn't considered..." Her thoughts raced. There were so many people they might be able to save, not just the ones at the Conclave. And there were so many ways they could mess things up. Bethana took a deep breath and chose to focus on the hope rather than the fear. She'd had enough of fear. "Do you think we can save him? If we can find him before he has to use magic to defend himself, he won't be arrested. They'll never have reason to put him in a cell." _Let alone leave him to starve to death._

"I can find him," Cole- Compassion said, sounding more hopeful himself. "I can stop the bad day, stop them from hurting him. I can save his mother and sister. It hasn't happened yet."

"He'll still be a mage you know," she said gently as possible consequences darted through her mind. "He'll need training."

Cole looked puzzled a moment then frowned at her. "You want me to let the Circle have him. I want to **protect** him."

"He needs to learn control," she had to insist. "If he hasn't hurt anyone, if he turns himself in willingly they won't lock him up. If he doesn't learn he could hurt somebody else or himself. You could take him to Rhys. He'd teach him, wouldn't he? He'd help keep the boy safe. You can see your friend again."

Longing and uncertainty warred in Cole's expression, and all at once Bethana realized that she'd erased more than she'd really intended to. Rhys wouldn't know him. Cullen wouldn't know her. None of their friends would recognize either of them; they'd have to start all over.

An echo of the grief she'd felt upon losing them welled up inside, but she reminded herself fiercely that starting over wasn't the end of the world. So long as they were alive they could become friends again. She'd scour the world to find them all again if necessary, and she'd wait as long as she had to for Cullen to come around to the idea of liking a mage. They'd make new memories. Things might not ever be the same, but that didn't mean they couldn't be _good_.

"I'm sure if we'd been able to ask him Rhys would want the chance to get to know you again," she said. Cole's gaze lifted to meet hers. "I'd want that chance in his shoes."

Bethana waited a minute, but when no reply was forthcoming her gaze turned towards the second presence to give him time to think. "I'm sorry, but I'm not sure I know who you are," she said to the patient golden spirit that somehow provoked a quiet sense of respect with just its presence.

"I am called Faith," the spirit said. "We had not met before the Veil tore, but I have been friend to your kind."

"She was keeping Rhys' Evangeline alive," Cole explained quietly.

"Before that I joined with another: Wynne. I will need to find again soon. Her circle is under attack," Faith said with a calm sort of certainty.

"Blood mages. Demons. Surprise and fear and pain and the templars fall back. Others are caught. Trapped. Hurt," Cole murmured fretfully.

Bethana flinched then stared at them both. The name Wynne sounded somehow familiar. Where had she heard that? "Wait- Blood magic. Is that- Are you talking about **Cullen's** circle? The one on Lake Calenhad? That's happening **now**?"

Faith nodded, then her attention turned elsewhere. "Wynne will fall soon. I have to go."

If Feredan's Circle was falling then they'd been dropped right into the middle of the Fifth Blight, and the events that would torment Cullen for the rest of his life were occurring as they spoke.

"Where?" she demanded. "Maybe I can help." She wasn't sure how much she could do against an entire tower of demons and abominations, but it was for _Cullen_. "I have to try."

Faith studied her long enough to begin to make Bethana self-conscious before nodding in apparent approval. "There," she stated, pointing southwest. Then the spirit wavered and disappeared; there were faint sounds of distant fighting in the air before that faded as well.

Bethana turned back to Cole- Compassion, guilt turning her tone apologetic. "I want to help you with the boy, with Cole, but..."

"But you want to help Cullen too," he finished for her without an ounce of judgement or disappointment in his tone. "I will save the boy. I will... I will think about taking him to Rhys. You should help Cullen. Maybe you can take away some of his nightmares. Maybe he won't frown so much."

"Thank you," Bethana said with great relief and a surge of affection that she hoped the kind spirit could feel. She pressed against the Veil and felt herself beginning to wake. She glanced back. "See you when I dream?" They still had a great deal to figure out between Solas and Corypheus and apparently the Blight on top of it all, but she would be unable to focus on any of that until they'd saved those who weighed heaviest on their hearts.

Compassion nodded even as he faded away. "I will speak to you later," he said with a glimmer of humor, using the words she'd said to him so often.

He was already gone, but Bethana answered anyway, her mouth pulled up into a fond smile that lingered even as she woke.

"How do you know?"


	7. Ferelden - Hope is the Thing

Ferelden:

Hope is the Thing with Feathers

* * *

She woke with pine needles in her white-blond hair and an ant crawling across her pale cheek. She brushed it off with a faint grimace and clung to the memory of which direction Faith had been pointing as she got to her feet. She probably should have settled into a brisk walk but the knowledge of what she was headed towards and the memory of the haunted pain in Cullen's voice when he'd finally told her what happened to him in that circle drove her into a determined jog instead.

She hadn't thought to ask how far the tower was from where she'd fallen asleep. She hadn't thought to ask a lot of things. _Why did I wake up in the woods instead of in the Circle? Is there a younger version of me in Ostwick? Should I try to change what happened in Kirkwall, at Adamant, or should I not risk changing too much and just start searching for Corypheus? Or Solas? If I found Varric and told him to stay out of the Deep Roads, would he listen? Is there any way to kill Corypheus without having to deal with that blighted dragon of his first? Do I tell my friends the truth when I find them? Would they believe me?_

She missed her advisors, official and otherwise, dreadfully. She'd come to rely on their council, their wisdom and their support so heavily that without them she felt like she was missing a limb. Another limb.

Flexing her newly restored hand, Bethana fought the melancholy and worry away. She'd find them again. Things would work out. She refused to allow them to do otherwise.

She avoided thoughts of what she was going to do when she found Solas.

As it turned out, she was not terribly far away from Lake Calenhad. It took her hours instead of days to reach the shore, but those long hours were filled with the worst of her imagination conjuring all the things that might be happening to the younger version of her husband. She knew he'd survived, but she also knew that what was happening would haunt him for the rest of his life. She'd give almost anything to spare him from even a few of those nightmares, so she pushed herself to go faster, farther, until her heartbeat pounded in her ears, every breath wheezed as she pulled it into her aching chest, and even her best rejuvenating spells ceased to help.

"I am so out of shape," she groaned, more convinced than ever that she had somehow gotten thrown into her original, younger body. Before the mage war and the Inquisition she'd never had much cause to run or even walk for long distances. The most she could boast was a great deal of walking up and down the tower stairs. She was a sweaty, gasping mess by the time she stumbled out of the woods and onto the shore of Lake Calenhad.

She didn't have time to collapse the way she wanted too, but Bethana had to stop and just breathe for a few minutes, bent with her hands braced on her knees as she eyed the water and tried to figure out how she was going to get to the tower in the center of it all. The tall structure was awfully foreboding despite the bright late-morning sun, but perhaps that was only because she knew what waited inside.

"Somehow I doubt the templars are just going to let a strange mage stroll into that mess," she muttered to herself. "So not only do I have to get across the water, I have to do it in the middle of the day without being noticed and sneak into the tower afterwards." The templars within were probably incredibly distracted, but 'borrowing' a boat from the nearby village and rowing across still seemed too risky. She couldn't swim that far, especially with how exhausted she already was. That left shape-shifting.

Bethana was not very good at shape-shifting. There had only been time for a couple of lessons begged from Morrigan between the time she found out about the witch's ability to change into animals and the fight with Corypheus after which Morrigan had disappeared to places unknown. She'd practiced on her own but only ever managed one shape- and that only for short periods and only some of the time. Fortunately, that one shape had wings. Unfortunately, if her magic decided to give out on her halfway through the change she would likely die as a horribly misshapen mismatch of animal and human.

That was not how she wanted her great achievement of time-travel to end.

She took her one last deep breath and the ache in her chest finally faded. A couple steps backwards hid her in the shadows of the trees. _Maker, please let this work. Please let me be in time to do some good,_ she prayed silently. Then she closed her eyes and focused on feeding her magic into her memory of the finch, the way it looked, the way it acted, the way it **felt** to be small and fluttery, covered in feathers and full of curiosity and caution.

When the memory and magic were compressed so tightly inside her that it felt like a warm, solid mass of power near her heart, she switched the direction of her magic and let it flow back out to her limbs. Warmth filled her from her head to her toes until she felt like she **was** magic rather than flesh and bone. Then she opened her eyes, stretched out her little brown wings, and took off for the tower.

Flying was a marvel. Even doing her best to focus on her goal, Bethana couldn't help but relish the way the wind slid over and under her wings, lifting her up, carrying her onward. She was tired though. Her muscles were tired and her magic was tired, and for a while she wasn't sure she'd make it across the lake.

She made it, in the end, though she very nearly ended her clumsy flight by slamming into the tower wall. She flared her wings frantically and managed just barely to redirect her flight into a nearby sliver of a window. The finch breathed a tiny sigh of relief when the room proved to be empty. A moment later she was standing in her human form again, feeling oddly tall and awkward.

A pained shout from somewhere nearby cut off her attempt to catch her breath again. She breathed a quiet curse and hurried out into the hallway.

There were signs of struggle everywhere, scorch marks and jagged bits of ice that refused to melt, scattered books and belongings, chunks carved out of walls and furniture by the desperate swings of swords and claws, blood on the floor and the stench of charred flesh. The air practically hummed with magic. The Veil felt thin and ragged, more like cheesecloth than a wall between her and the Fade. Beneath it all Bethana couldn't help but notice that the tower wasn't all that different from the Circle where she had grown up. It was too easy to imagine her childhood friends, teachers and protectors left dying in such chaos. The horror of it all made her skin crawl and added desperation to her sprint down the hall towards the sound of fighting.

She skidded to a stop outside another room, her shoulder hitting the doorframe hard in her hurry. Her gaze sought out the threat first: a rage demon loomed over a trio backed into a corner, the latest in a long line of abominations and demons judging by the mess of bodies and scorch marks on the floor. Without thinking Bethana threw out a hand and gripped the beast with the best ice magic she could muster. It made her muscles ache; she remembered all the skills she'd learned over the last thirteen plus years but didn't have any of the magical stamina she'd gained along the way. Her younger body didn't not appreciate being pushed to do so much so fast, but her magic obeyed her will and the rage demon froze mid-roar. The heavy swing of a sword shattered the monster and melting chunks of demon went sliding across the floor in all directions, leaving smoldering black spots wherever they finally stopped.

With the demon out of the way, Bethana found herself face to face with its intended victims- or rather sword to face as the stranger lifted his weapon to ward her off.

"Don't," the templar commanded, his voice strong and fierce despite his obvious exhaustion. His salt and pepper hair was slick with sweat at his temples. His sword wavered even as he braced it with both hands. The resigned determination written in his dark eyes reminded her of the day Haven fell when Cullen believed dying was inevitable and had only sought to die well, to die fighting.

Then something moved behind the templar and that resignation gave way to desperation. _Perhaps he not so ready to die after all_ , Bethana thought. The two mages- young faces, a teenage girl and a boy who looked to be several years younger- peered out from behind their protector. Bethana held her arms down and out at her sides, turning them slowly to show their lack of scars.

"I'm not a blood mage. I'm not going to hurt you. I'm here to help," she said with every ounce of calm she could summon.

The sword pointed at her face wavered again then lowered a little, but the templar's eyes narrowed.

"You aren't part of this circle," he said. "Who are you? What are you doing here?"

"My name's Bethana. I... was nearby and felt the Veil starting to tear. It seemed like the sort of thing someone should stop," Bethana answered, trying not to wince. She couldn't tell him the truth, of course, but she wished she could have thought of something that sounded more likely than that. She bit back a sigh. "I apparently have a difficult time staying out of other people's problems."

By the look on his face he wasn't sure he believed her, but the tell tale sounds of abominations making their slow, stumbling way down the hall towards them drew his attention away.

A twist of Bethana's hand summoned a rejuvenation and healing spell that sunk into the templar's tired muscles. It was automatic, an ingrained reaction to having an exhausted ally, but Bethana realized she should have warned him as soon as she'd done it. She had to step back quickly when the templar's sword swung at her, though he stilled again when he realized she hadn't done him any harm.

"Sorry," she blurted. "I should have asked-" But then there were a trio of abominations crowding into the doorway and they didn't have time to talk any longer.

She was closest to the door and the monsters lunged for her first. The lightning spell she used scorched her fingertips and threatened to run wild through the room, to strike at her allies as well. She controlled it, but barely.

 _All right. No more lightning until I get some time to practice,_ she told herself, trembling in the aftermath. It had been ages since she'd almost hurt someone with poor control. She **hated** that feeling, the knowledge that **she** was a threat to people she wanted to protect.

She used ice and fire from then on, and only the simplest, easiest to control spells. Ice slowed the abominations' steps; fire weakened them. It was the templar, though, that destroyed all three in the end. He was strong again, with the aid of her spells, and he had the experience and skill to make the most of it.

"How long have you been fighting these things?" Bethana panted when the creatures were dead at his feet. "How did this even happen?"

"Blood mages," the templar spat. "They turned on the templars, turned on the other mages. They summoned demons to kill anyone who wouldn't join them, then of course they couldn't control the demons or the abominations. Fools." His expression was twisted in hatred and disgust, though it eased into something troubled but less harsh when he turned to check that the kids were untouched. "It happened a while ago; the whole tower is like this. I don't even know if there's anyone else left alive."

"There has to be," Bethana said, knowing full well that there was at least one other survivor. "We should look for them. If there is any chance that there are others alive, we have to try. They might need our help. We certainly need theirs. It isn't safe to stay here," she added when the templar gave her a look that clearly doubted her sanity. "And the more of us there are, the better chance we have of surviving, right?" The templar frowned at her, weighing her words- weighing her.

"We'll die if we go out there," the youngest apprentice, the boy, protested in a tearful voice that trembled so much that it was hard to make out his words. "Everyone else is d-dead. I don't want to die too. Please. I don't want to die too."

The teenage girl bit her lip, but she wrapped her arms around the boy to quiet his protests. He clung to her; she lifted her chin bravely when the templar's gaze sought out her own. "I want to know. If they're not all dead- I want to know. I don't want to stand around in this- this graveyard, just **waiting**..."

The templar sighed and stared down at his bloodied sword and the mess of bodies around them.

"I'll help you keep them safe. I'll do everything in my power," Bethana promised quietly. At long last the templar nodded wearily.

"Very well. Perhaps we must. But you'll listen to me. If we're going to survive this we have to be smart."

"All right," Bethana agreed. Despite his insistence on being in charge, he motioned her through the doorway first. _Fair enough,_ she thought. _He has no reason to trust me at his back or with the kids._ It felt more natural leading anyways, though she followed his directions without complaint when he gave them.

"What are your names?" she asked quietly when they were on their way. There was silence and for a moment she thought she wouldn't get an answer.

"Erik," the templar said somewhat grudgingly.

"I'm Flura," the teenager added. "And this is Trum."

"I am glad to meet you," Bethana said. _And terribly glad that you were alive_ _ **to**_ _meet._

They didn't say much else as they walked aside from quiet orders from the templar to pause or turn. A few times they had to duck into other rooms to avoid monsters. Usually such tactics worked, and Bethana took every opportunity to check the rooms over for badly-needed potions and supplies. She had her staff with her but little else. Her younger self had certainly not been prepared for a journey let alone a long string of battles.

Sometimes they were unable to avoid the demons and abominations and had to fight their way through, but the monsters traveled in small groups that Bethana and Erik managed to handle, though not entirely without injury.

Then they reached the stairs and ran into a different problem.

"What are you doing?" Erik demanded- though he was careful to keep his voice down- when Bethana headed for the stairs leading up to the next floor. "We need to go down. If there's any chance of us getting out of the tower alive, we need to head for the door."

Bethana froze. She couldn't tell him that Cullen was upstairs. She wasn't even sure how she knew that because she couldn't remember him telling her that detail, but she was certain of it all the same.

"But we have to go up," she said, scrambling inwardly for a reason that might convince him. "Can't you feel that? The shift in magic- someone's used a cleanse up there recently." It was easy enough to keep her expression earnest- the desperation behind it was real enough after all, even if the explanation was nonsense. She could feel the effects of the cleanses and smites that templars used certainly, but not at any great distance and only immediately before or after they were used. "There's someone alive, a templar up there. We have to go up." Erik only eyed her suspiciously, and her desperation deepened. He was right to doubt her, but she _needed_ to go up there, and the fact that he refused to listen sparked rebellion within her. "I'm going up," she said at last. Her chin lifted a fraction. "Do what you want."

"But we're supposed to stay together!" Flura protested worriedly when Bethana turned and started up the stairs.

The fear in the girl's voice washed over her like ice water and her feet paused on the steps. Bethana closed her eyes and made herself take a slow breath. _What am I doing?_ she wanted, needed to reach Cullen but... he would survive without her, she knew he would. The other three had almost certainly died the first time around. Could she really leave them behind?

"You're right," Bethana said. She forced herself to turn around. "I won't leave you. I promise I won't. But please, I really do believe there's someone alive up there- someone who probably needs our help."

She couldn't read Erik's expression at all, and when his silence continued she swallowed the knot of emotion in her throat and stepped down off the stairs.

"All right," the templar said. Her bowed head jerked up so she could stare at him. He didn't look pleased, but he nodded towards the stairs. "If you're so certain, we'll go up."


	8. Ferelden - Steel My Heart

_Disclaimer: The pieces of the Chant of Light in this chapter do not belong to me; they came from one of the Dragon Age books, though I rearranged some of them to suit my whim._

* * *

Ferelden:

Steel My Heart

* * *

They found little but demons and dead over the next three floors- dozens upon dozens of dead. The kids stopped speaking and stopped looking at anything but Erik's back as they waded through the destruction of their home. Erik's expression could not have been any grimmer; Bethana felt her own begin to mirror it.

 _So much death,_ she thought wearily. _And for what? What good did this do? What did anyone ever gain from this mess? So much pointless waste._

There was a pile of bodies pushed against one wall when the approach of abominations made them duck into what looked to have been a library once. It was hardly the first pile of corpses they'd seen, and they wouldn't have paid it much mind, but out of the corner of her eye Bethana could have sworn she saw it move. She spun to face it with fire sparking in her palm, fully expecting some hideous abomination to emerge from the mess. Instead the bodies where still, as they should be, for several moments at least. Then the whole thing shifted, a subtle rise and fall as though the pile was breathing.

"Erik," she said with quiet warning. The templar turned from where he'd been watching the doorway and frowned at her. When the pile shifted again though he saw it, and his expression changed. He motioned for the kids to back further away and stepped closer with his sword at the ready. He glanced at Bethana then nodded. She took that as permission to attack. Something about the situation felt off though, so rather than using the fire in her hand, she shoved a solid mass of air forward in an attack meant to stun rather than kill.

There was a startled yelp, then hands came clawing out from beneath the pile, struggling to pull one of the bodies forward out from under the rest. Bethana would have assumed it was a moving corpse controlled by some demon except that she had never heard a possessed body yelp like that.

"Wait!" she yelled. She threw out a hand and pulled a shield into existence in front of Erik before the swing of his sword could remove the stranger's head from his body. "Don't kill him!"

The sword glanced off the shield about the same time the stranger made a panicked counterattack and fist-shaped chunk of stone shot forward and thumped Erik solidly in his armored chest. The templar stumbled back a step with a grunt and lifted his hand. An almost tangible purity swirled briefly in the air around him, then all of the magic was abruptly drained out of the area.

The stranger gasped like a fish out of water, suddenly completely defenseless. Bethana faired a little better since the cleanse hadn't been aimed at her. The sudden lack of magic left her lightheaded and trembling, but she kept her wits about her enough to grab Erik's arm before he could finish off the stranger. With the Veil so frail, the effects of the cleanse faded almost as quickly as they'd come.

"Wait," Bethana repeated, holding on to Erik. "Look at him. That's not a corpse."

"Blood mage," the templar practically growled, unrelenting.

"I'm not!" the stranger protested weakly. He waved an arm at them as though to prove his words the way that Bethana had- by showing unmarked skin- but he was covered in blood from the corpses. It was hardly convincing. He winced and wiped his arms on his ruined shirt to try to clean them enough to at least show a lack of scars. "I swear I'm not. I wasn't part of this. They were going to kill me, so I hid. That's all. If I were a blood mage, why would I be hiding?"

"With as many demons as there are around, I doubt even the mages that summoned them could control them. You could be hiding from the abominations, not the blood mages. You could have used others' blood and not your own," Erik pointed out, his eyes narrowed distrustfully.

The stranger glanced anxiously around the room and spotted the kids. His expression lit up with hope. "Flura," he said, "you remember me, right? I just passed my harrowing. You know me. You know I'm not a blood mage. You know I would never help them do this to our home."

The teenager bit her lip and shifted nervously. "I... remember you, Mathis," she admitted. Frightened and apologetic, she could hardly look at him. "But I don't... I don't know. I don't know if I trust you. I didn't think **anyone** would do this."

Bethana tugged once sharply on Erik's arm to get his attention when Mathis' expression fell. "We can't just kill him on suspicion. What if he's telling the truth?"

"What if he isn't?" the templar asked.

"He didn't use blood magic when we startled him into attacking, and it isn't like there isn't plenty around. If he's a victim like the rest of us... We could use the help." Erik's scowl deepened, but she knew she was getting through to him. She could see it in the way his gaze swept over Mathis again. "I'll take responsibility for him. I'll stay between him and the kids at all times," Bethana promised.

The templar grumbled something under his breath, but he eventually he lowered his sword and stepped back. "I'll hold you to that. And at the first sign of blood magic, he's **done**."

"Understood." Bethana turned towards the stranger as Erik moved back towards the kids. She held out her hand to help the other mage up. "I'm Bethana," she said. The stranger took her hand tentatively and stood.

"Mathis. Thanks for that," he said, running a shaking hand through his hair. He was in desperate need of a bath, but then, they all were. Bethana's sense of smell had given out two floors earlier. Mathis glanced back at the pile of bodies. "I thought I was going to suffocate under there but it seemed better than... I didn't know what else to do. Those were people I knew. People I cared about. I just... I didn't know what else to do. I wasn't sure there was anyone else left alive. Except the blood mages."

He seemed dazed by the experience and likely to stand there staring at the dead indefinitely if she didn't do anything. Erik was herding the kids towards the door, so Bethana put a hand on Mathis' shoulder and nudged him in the same direction.

"I can't imagine what this has been like," she said gently. "But we need to keep moving, all right? Everything else- the memories, the mourning- it's going to have to wait."

Mathis' green eyes finally pulled away from the bodies to stare at her, then he nodded slowly. "All right. You're right." And he followed her out into the hall.

It was nice having another adult mage with them. Even if Mathis was young had less experience fighting, he knew the basics well and wasn't as worn out as Bethana. He helped keep them alive when they ran into abominations, and Erik's suspicion of him faded just a little bit more each time. He was as quiet as the rest of them as they went up yet another floor; Bethana missed the easy banter of her friends with silent ferocity.

The floors got smaller as they got closer to the top and the stairs got narrower. It felt like they had been fighting for an age; they were all covered in the sweat and blood of battle, tired and covered in small injuries that it wasn't worth using their exhausted magic to fix.

All that pain and fatigue seemed to disappear when Bethana heard a hoarse male scream from the floor above them as they trudged up yet another set of stairs. Adrenaline shot through her, and Bethana nearly shoved past Mathis in her hurry to get to the source of that anguished sound. She barely remembered her promise to keep between him and the kids and grabbed his arm to keep him with her as she jogged the last several steps, completely ignoring his protest and Erik's behind him.

Experience- and mistakes made in the early days of the Inquisition- was all that made her stop even briefly to weigh the situation instead of bursting out of the stairwell, though even that pause was painful. The whole floor was one round room with another stairwell opposite the one where she stood. There were three mages with bloodied marks on their arms and a desire demon clustered around two men in templar armor kneeling on the floor. Another mage stood guard near a pair of glowing magic cages, taunting the templars trapped within as a fear demon hovered in the background chuckling under its breath in dry, rasping tones like sand sliding over bones.

 _Cullen_. Bethana barely had time to register the presence of her husband kneeling in one of the cages, desperate prayers and recitations of the Chant tumbling clumsily, ceaselessly from his lips as he rocked back and forth. One of the uncaged templars gave a groan and fell dead at the desire demon's feet. She was already too late to help him. There was no more time to think or second-guess. Bethana downed a lyrium potion and summoned a burst of flame that wrapped around the nearest two blood mages. Then she scurried out of the way as the clanking of armor alerted her to Erik coming up the last steps. He lunged out of the stairwell and skewered one of the mages that was on fire before they knew what hit them.

Bethana tried to keep an eye on her companions even as she rolled out of the way of a wall of jagged ice that could have torn her apart. She felt Erik smite two of the blood mages on the other side of the room even as a fist of stone slammed into the one who had put out the fire she'd started and sent the ice after her. Mathis nodded to her briefly from the stairwell when she shot him a grateful glance. The surviving uncaged templar took advantage of the sudden chaos to crawl over to the bodies of the other templars who had been killed and take one of their abandoned swords. The next time Erik managed to smite a mage, the wounded templar stabbed his dazed tormentor through the chest. She heard Erik call him Ratth, and her mind tucked the information away.

 _Two down_ , Bethana thought, trying to watch the demons as well even as lighting tore through the place where she'd just been standing. The creatures stayed out of the way and watched at first, calculating, but then Desire headed towards Erik and Ratth who were trying to take down the third blood mage and Fear edged towards Mathis. Worry shot through her.

She had her own blood mage to deal with though and her lyrium potion had already worn off. He knocked her down with a well placed surged of red magic. She scrambled to her feet and the next wave of magic grazed her arm instead of tearing through her heart. She could feel his blood magic pulling at her feet, slowing her down. Bethana leaped towards him and flung a handful of flame at his face, weak but bright. He brushed it aside easily, looking smug, assured of an easy victory as her magic waned. The expression was abruptly wiped away when Bethana neglected her magic entirely and caught him in the temple with the heavy weight at the end of her staff. The blow knocked him off balance, and she ended his life with a shard of ice through his chest.

She didn't have time to feel victorious. A wave of terror washed over her as the fear demon abandoned a cowering Mathis to turn to her. She stumbled. Doubt rose like a tide within her and everything else faded away.

 _What am I doing?_

 _What have I done?_

 _What if I can't save them?_

 _What if I can't save_ _ **anyone**_ _?_

 _What I've only cursed myself to watch them die all over again?_

 _What if I've made it worse?_

 _Messing with time- I've ruined everything._

 _Cullen will never love me._

 _I'll never see my friends again._

 _I've erased everything that matters-_

Bethana didn't even realize that she was laying on the floor, tears streaming down her cheeks until a wave of fire passed over her head and drove Fear back. Suddenly she could breathe again, hear and see and **think** again. Determination pushed against the hopelessness; hard-won bravery surfaced beneath the fear. Mathis was yelling at her to get up, using the last of his magic to try to keep Fear at bay.

Across the room the last blood mage screamed in pain and rage as the wounded templar sliced him across the back. The scream turned into a roar as the mage began to turn into an abomination, blood magic pulling the corpses of the templars nearer, but the sound cut off abruptly as Erik swung and lopped off his head.

Mathis' magic was failing fast, but he bought Bethana enough time to gather her own. She timed her ice spell to coat the fear demon just before Mathis' last fist of stone slammed into the beast, praying that it would work, that it would be enough. The fear demon shattered with a shriek that made her ears ring. She climbed laboriously to her feet, and they all turned towards the last threat.

Desire's magic washed over them all and they swayed, but all they _really_ wanted in that moment was to defeat her, and her magic was spread too thin between them all to capture them properly. Bethana and Mathis wrapped her in flames and she shrieked. They weren't strong enough to kill her, but as she lunged towards them both, Erik and the other templar swung at her from either side and nearly cleaved her in two. She wailed again then faded, and just like that the fight was over.

The room seemed oddly quiet; without the sounds of fighting all that remained was their heavy breathing and Cullen's muttering.

 _Cullen_ , Bethana thought again. She barely noticed the two apprentices peering out of the stairwell. She pulled out one of their precious healing potions with hurried, clumsy fingers and shoved it at Mathis, pointing him towards the injured templar. She would have no magic for healing until she'd had a few minutes for her magic reserves to start recovering, and she'd waited long enough to see the man she'd fought so hard to find.

She hurried at last toher templar- ignoring Ratth when he yelled at her to keep away- and paused just a moment to glance at the other caged templar. While Cullen was in constant motion, the other templar was silent and staring, still as a statue but for his breathing. She felt a pang of concern, but she couldn't bring herself to focus on him when Cullen was right in front of her.

She knelt next to Cullen's cage, pressing careful fingertips to the barrier between them. The magic in it crackled faintly like static electricity. Cullen flinched a little at the sound but refused to look at her. The ache in her chest grew.

"Hi there," Bethana said, quiet and coaxing. "It's all right. The blood mages are dead. We're here to help you. We're going to get you out." She paused a little between each sentence, but he never replied. She kept trying "What's your name? I'm Bethana. Erik's here; I bet you know him. Do you want to talk to him instead? I know this has to be...beyond difficult. Would you look at me? Look at Erik? I know you probably don't trust anyone right now, but I'm not a blood mage. I promise, I just want to help." Cullen's prayers grew a little louder in response as though he was trying to drown her out, but otherwise he refused to acknowledge her existence.

 _Don't cry. Don't you dare,_ Bethana ordered herself. _They won't understand. You knew he wouldn't really see you, not now. He told you as much himself._ She'd expect distrust and anger, she'd been braced for that. Somehow being ignored entirely was worse, and it made her worry about him all the more. Perhaps she was making things worse by trying to help. Perhaps he'd been less frantic if she left him alone. She glanced over at Erik who was still trying to talk the injured templar into drinking the potion- apparently he didn't trust them not to try to poison him. She turned back to Cullen and just listened, helplessly at a loss for words.

"O Maker, hear my cry. Guide me through the blackest night. Steel my heart against the temptations of the wicked. Make me- make me to rest in the warmest places... You have stood with me when all others have forsaken me. I have faced armies with You as my shield, and though I bear scars... beyond counting," his voice broke a little at the words, hopelessness eating away at his determination. It hurt her heart, but he continued on doggedly, "nothing can- nothing can break me except your absence... Maker, my enemies are abundant. Many- many are- My enemies are abundant. Many-" Then Cullen's recitation stumbled in the middle of a verse and his memory seemed to fail him in his exhaustion. Distress twisted his expression as he kept repeating the words, trying to remember the next ones with a growing desperation that left him breathless, as though the Chant were the only thing holding him together and if he lost it... "My enemies- my enemies are- Maker-"

Bethana couldn't bear it. "My enemies are abundant," she whispered in tandem when he repeated the words again. He went silent as she continued and stopped rocking, still and startled, and she wondered again if she was doing more harm than good. But still she spoke, finishing the verses he couldn't remember. "Many are those who rise up against me. But my faith sustains me. In the long hours of the night when hope has abandoned me, I still see the stars and know Your Light remains."

He started speaking again, saying the words with her in hoarse, cautious tones. "I have heard the sound, a song in the stillness, the echo of Your voice, calling creation to wake from its slumber. Maker, though the darkness comes upon me, I shall embrace the Light. I shall weather the storm. I shall endure."

He was calmer by the time they stopped, at least a little. Bethana was silent, not wanting to break the ever so fragile sense of peace. She held her breath as Cullen's gaze finally lifted enough to dart around the room, taking in the apprentices, the state of his fellow templars and the bodies of the blood mages before finally, **finally** looking at her. He looked bad, pale and sweating with tremors running through his whole frame- painfully young. There was such distrust in his eyes... he'd never looked at her that way before, and it struck her all at once that she was looking at a stranger. She hardly knew this man, and he certainly didn't know her. The grief, the loss of her husband hit her anew, and she had to fight to keep the tears from welling in her eyes.

He was alive, that was what mattered. He was **alive** , and she had to believe that he could learn to trust her again someday, that he could come to love her.

She was so lost in looking at him that it startled her when he spoke.

"This won't work. I know this is a trap. It isn't real. It isn't real." His voice shook a little, but he held her gaze with a stubborn sort of desperation, and she felt oddly proud of him. Damaged, he might be, but he was not broken.

She considered her words a moment before replying softly, "What is it exactly that you think I want from you?"

"To- to break, to believe your lies. To let you feed off my desires and..." He grit his teeth. "It won't work."

"And if all I want is for you to be strong, to hold on to your faith and who you are?" she asked. She got a blank stare in return. "This isn't a trick. I'm not a blood mage or a demon," she said, her voice as gentle and calm as she could make it. "Honestly, if I was trying to make you believe that all your desires had come true, would I have left us all in such a mess? I'd have shown up with an army and taken this all away, don't you think?"

Cullen looked around the room again. His expression grew grimmer as he took in the lifeless bodies of his friends and the worn, bedraggled state of the rest of them, but little by little some of his disbelief began to falter. Erik had moved on to trying to get the last caged templar to respond. Ratth had moved as far away from the mages as he could get, clutching his sword and watching all of them with half-wild eyes.

There a distant- though not as distant as she would have like- roar of a demon from the floor below them, and they all flinched. Mathis went to the doorway to peer nervously down the stairs.

"We can't stay here," he said.

"We can't leave until we figure out how to get rid of these barriers," Bethana replied. Cullen watched her warily as she pushed at the cage with the barest bit of magic. She got shocked for her troubles when the barrier shoved her magic back violently; it was a good thing she hadn't used more force. She grimaced and rubbed her tingling fingers against her leg, trying to drive the sensation away. She felt a cleanse wash over the other templar's cage to no avail; it didn't falter at all.

Erik shot a quelling look at Ratth when he cursed. "Killing the mage who put them up should have done it, but if it wasn't one of these..." Erik trailed off, frowning at the bodies around them.

"It was," Ratth said, his voice little more than a growl as he adjusted his grip on his sword.

Erik sighed. "Then something else is holding the magic in place." He hesitated a long moment before continuing. "It is possible that only blood magic can undo it."

"There has to be another option," Bethana said. "We can't use blood magic." Even if the templars allowed it, even if she could convince herself that it wasn't inherently evil, Cullen might never trust again if he saw her do such a thing.

Besides which, the Hero of Ferelden was on her way and had obviously figured something out the first time around. Not that Bethana could explain that.

"I wasn't suggesting anyone should," Erik said. The words sounded sincere, but he looked tired and a little hopeless as he stared at the cages.

"Uldred," Cullen said so quietly that Bethana almost missed the name. "He was giving the orders. He took the senior mages-" Anguished and unsteady, his voice broke at the memory and he rocked slightly where he knelt, threatening to withdraw entirely once more. Bethana pressed against the barrier with her hand, ignoring the faintly crackling static. Cullen swallowed convulsively, looking at her then down and away. "The sounds... he was torturing them, recruiting them to his cause by force then... It got quiet a little while ago, but no one came down. I don't know why."

"Do you think Uldred might be the key to freeing them?" Bethana asked, glancing at Erik. The older templar considered then nodded slowly.

"It is possible," he agreed.

"You can't fight him," Cullen protested, his slumped posture straightening in alarm. "He'd kill you- turn you into one of them," he said to the mages then turned to the templars, "or trap you here with us. He's too strong. You **can't** -"

"Whoa, that isn't the plan, is it?" Mathis spoke up. "I mean, he's right. We're exhausted. We don't have enough people or potions- We barely made it this far."

"What are you suggesting?" Ratth demanded, angry and defensive and entirely unwilling to accept advice from any mage at the moment. Even if said mage was agreeing with a templar. "That we leave them here? That we abandon our comrades?"

"That we stay," Bethana said, raising her voice to be heard. "That we wait here for help to come- or for the fight to come to us." Help _would_ come; they just had to survive long enough for it to matter.

"The abominations are going to keep coming," Mathis warned. He seemed to realize none of them were going to be willing to leave though; his expression was resigned. "They'll wear us out little by little. We don't have enough supplies... If someone was going to send help, wouldn't they have done so already?"

Erik's lips thinned as they all looked to him for the final decision, but he didn't shy away from the burden. He glanced at the kids who were quiet and sticking close to him, frightened little shadows. "Fighting Uldred is too risky, and we're not leaving anyone behind. Staying is our only real option."

The roar came again, a little bit closer. Bethana picked up her staff and got to her feet again. "Then we'd best get ready to defend ourselves."


	9. Ferelden - Trust Yet Unearned

Ferelden:

Trust Yet Unearned

* * *

Fighting against demons always felt like chaos no matter how many there were. Bethana and her companions weren't even outnumbered, but they were tired to the point that she was beginning to worry that they wouldn't survive to be rescued after all.

The last rage demon's fire scorched a path across the ground too fast for the exhausted fighters to dodge, and Ratth gave a hoarse scream as the heat turned the armor that was supposed to protect his left side into a skin-searing hazard.

Mathis slowed the demon with a brittle ice spell long enough for the others to finish it off, then collapsed to the floor, panting heavily, his magic spent. He had done well, but casting spells in battle was a lot different than doing the same in a classroom setting.

Bethana was already turning her attention to the burned templar even as the demon went down. It was habit, instinct to help. She hadn't quite learned her lesson from startling Erik when she first arrived. A simple gesture, a twist of her wrist sent a pale green healing spell swirling into the cracks in the templar's armor. He flinched back, and between one gasp and the next, the pain on his face warped into a murderous rage.

Ratth gave a wild yell and lunged towards Bethana with his sword raised. Taken completely off guard, she yelped and scrambled backwards. The templar's sword struck the floor where she'd been standing and he went after her again.

"Ratth, stop!" Erik ordered.

"It was just a healing spell!" Mathis protested, struggling to his feet.

The half-mad templar didn't seem to hear either of them. Bethana ducked a swing that could have taken off her head and tried to put the nearest obstacle- Cullen's cage- between herself and Ratth.

"I'm sorry!" she said. She couldn't fight him- not only because it would make him angrier, but because she simply didn't have enough magic left. "It was a healing spell. I wasn't thinking. I should have asked first, but I swear I was just trying to help you."

He circled the cage to get at her, but she mirrored his movement and stayed out of reach. Between them Cullen stood, his expression brittle. Something about the tension in his clenched hands and stance suggested a familiar battle readiness, though whether he wanted to jump in to help her or the templar, Bethana didn't dare guess.

Ratth gave another shout and lunged at her again; his sword send sparks flying when it hit the cage instead of her. Erik finally caught him and wrestled the sword away. Ratth continued to yell and struggle.

"I'm sorry," Beth said again. Her voice shook. Perhaps it shouldn't have surprised her so much, but the attack from an ally was far more traumatic than anything the demons could throw at her. "I'm sorry." She felt **young** all of a sudden- young and alone and very much in over her head. She took a deep breath. Then another. And slowly calmed. She kept Cullen's cage between her and Ratth, and he slowly settled as well.

It wasn't until the room had settled into a long, tense silence that Bethana realized Cullen was watching her. His light brown eyes were narrowed in suspicion, and though there was a lot less anger behind it than there had been, it still made her heart lurch painfully.

"Who **are** you?" he asked.

"Bethana," she said. She was stuck with the story she'd already told Erik. "I was in the area, and I felt the Veil fraying. I came to find out what was going on and got caught up in this mess." It was worse lying to him than it had been lying to the others, but she hoped the guilt didn't show.

"Walking by... You're an apostate," he accused.

Bethana winced. "I suppose I am," she said reluctantly. She hadn't really thought of it like that, but she couldn't- and didn't want to- go back to her Circle no matter how unintentionally she'd left it.

Her family was going to throw a fit. Having a mage in the family had been a little embarrassing for them, though they had handled it well and absolutely refused to abandon her, using the weight of their influence to allow her to visit them even when she lived in the Circle. Having an apostate in the family was another matter entirely. She wondered if they knew yet, if they were worried, if she should write them.

She pulled her focus back to the wary templar with a quiet plea for a little faith. "But I've been through my Harrowing, and I'm not a blood mage. I'm not your enemy."

"So you say," Cullen said.

Bethana gave him a crooked, tired smile. "So I say."


	10. Ferelden - New Arrivals

Ferelden: New Arrivals

There wasn't even a word for how tired Bethana felt as the hours wore on. 'Exhausted' didn't begin to cover it. She felt as though every cell in her body had been wrung dry and stretched past its limit. Her very soul ached with the effort of trying to pull more magic from reserves that simply weren't there in her younger body. Her muscles trembled; her grip on her staff grew slack. She wasn't the only one feeling the strain.

"I don't know how much longer I can do this," Mathis wheezed, sinking to the ground as the latest batch of attackers finally fell.

"As long as we have to," Erik replied. It was a fairly convincing show of determination even if he was subtly leaning against the wall while he caught his breath.

Bethana nodded somewhat listlessly and sat next to Cullen's cage to rest while she could. He gave her an odd look every time she did that, probably wondering why she'd chosen that spot. She couldn't help herself. He spent much of his time pacing inside, his frustration at not being able to help them slowly but steadily overwhelming his fear.

She had barely gotten settled when they heard the sound of footsteps on the stairs moving towards them. There was a chorus of muttered curses from her allies as they all struggled back to their feet and fell into fighting stances.

Mathis threw a fireball the instant the first stranger showed his face at the top of the stairs. The weak spell was blocked by a templar shield, accompanied by a "Hey! That's rude," in a voice that pricked at Bethana's memories, and they all grew still. When the first people who stepped out of the stairway were not blood mages but young versions of the future king and queen of Ferelden, Bethana nearly dropped her staff in relief.

"Stop there," Erik said, low and stern enough that the strangers listened.

"Who are you?" Ratth demanded. He kept his sword pointed at Alistair despite the fact that most of his party looking nothing like mages.

"Erik. Ratth?" a grey-haired woman asked, stepping out from behind Alistair's defensive stance. "Flura, Trum, Mathis, Cullen, Len!" Disbelief blossomed into joy and relief on her wisened face.

"Wynne," Erik echoed her startled tone.

"Oh thank the Maker," the old woman said. "I was beginning to think there was no one else left." Her grey eyes, hungry for reassurance, grew moist as they swept over the children.

"How do we know you're not part of this treachery?" Ratth growled.

Wynne's spine stiffened abruptly. "If you think for one instant that I would have allowed **any** of this-"

"We don't have time to argue," the young woman next to Alistair interrupted before Wynn's sharp protest could gain steam. Even if she hadn't been wearing warden armor, Bethana would have know who she was. The Hero of Ferelden looked very much like the paintings she'd seen in the future of the queen: dark blond hair tucked into braids, light brown eyes and the bearing of nobility despite the sweat on her brow and the blood on her armor. She was taller than Bethana with a face that seemed made for fierce expressions and two daggers in her hands. Even if Bethana hadn't known who the woman was and who she would become, she would have found the Warden intimidating.

"The Knight-Commander is going to call for the Rite of Annulment if we can't find the First Enchanter and bring him back as proof that the abominations haven't taken everybody," Elissa Cousland continued.

"Please somebody tell me he's still alive," Alistair added hopefully.

Bethana's group traded discomforted glances.

"We don't know. Uldred captured some of the senior mages, but it was some time ago. We hadn't the strength to attempt a rescue," said Erik.

"You can't trust anyone who's been up there anyways," Cullen said darkly. "Even if he is alive. You don't understand... what he's capable of- what he's done to them. They'll turn on you. They'll wait until you trust them, then-"

"I don't know if you were listening, but if we don't have Irving, we're all going to have a hard time getting out of here alive," the blond elf with the wardens said in a clipped Antivan accent. "You included."

Cullen only frowned, looking very tired and lost. "Better that than risking the release of blood mages into the world."

There was a large man with the wardens as well, as tall and as muscular as a Qunari, though he had no horns. The scowl on his face grew increasingly forbidding at Cullen's words, and he gave a grunt that seemed to be an agreement.

"We can't just go up there and kill everyone," said Elissa. "We have to try."

"If nothing else, Uldred needs to be stopped," Bethana said before Cullen or Ratth could argue.

Elissa nodded, resolute. "Everything else can wait until we've seen the situation."

Bethana would have liked to offer to help, but in the state she was in she was likely to be more of a hindrance than anything. The wardens had managed all right without her the first time anyways. She sat back down next to Cullen's cage with a sigh as the wardens' group headed for the stairs leading up. Ratth grumbled, but he didn't try to stop them.

"We cleared out most of the tower on the way up," Wynne told Erik quietly. "I don't believe you should have any problems with abominations before we get back." She lingered a moment longer to speak to Mathis and the children, then she turned to follow the wardens. She gave Bethana a curious look as she passed- obviously aware that she wasn't from the Ferelden circle- but her suspicion turned quickly to confusion as their eyes met and Bethana felt a jolt of recognition.

 _Faith_ , she thought, mouthing the word without meaning to. The faith spirit she had met in the future and in her dreams was there inside Wynne. If her expression was anything to go by, the older mage could feel that the spirit knew Bethana too. Wynne's eyes turned contemplative, but she said nothing as she followed her companions up the stairs. Quiet fell over the group that remained- for a while.

"They'll never make it," Cullen stated quietly, tired. "Uldred is too strong. He'll be coming after us next."

"Then we'll fight as long and hard as we can," Bethana said without scolding. "But I wouldn't give up on them yet. They have to be strong to have made it all the way through the tower."

"They have to be tired," Mathis murmured worriedly.

Bethana pressed her lips together and didn't voice an argument. _They'll be all right. They have to be._


	11. Ferelden - Innumerable Steps

Ferelden:

Innumerable Steps

* * *

Whatever spell had been muting the sound from the Harrowing chamber broke partway through the fight. The sudden flood of sound- war calls and yelled orders, cries of pain and roars of frustration- sent a surge of alarm through them all. The sudden silence a quarter of an hour later was far worse.

Then, all at once, the cages around Cullen and the catatonic templar named Len were gone. They all just stared for a moment before Erik hurried over to check on his comrades.

"They did it," Bethana sighed in relief. "They won." Her gaze was drawn to Cullen as her templar hesitantly stepped past the boundary that had held him for so long. He flinched a little when Erik put a hand on his shoulder, but he seemed less frantic than he had since their arrival. Perhaps being able to touch Erik made him finally seem real.

 _Do not leap up and hug your not-yet-husband,_ she ordered herself sternly. _He'll think you're possessed._ She got slowly to her feet and kept her distance while he watched her warily from the corner of his eyes.

"Everyone still alive down here?" Alistair's tired but jovial voice floated down from the stairs. Murmurs of dismay came from the templars even as the mages sighed in relief to see the First Enchanter being helped down the stairs behind him. There were three other senior enchanters as well; they looked like they'd gone through a war but seemed physically intact for the most part. They seemed fairly sane too- if understandably distraught- but the wary templars had their swords leveled at them before they finished descending the stairs.

"Whoa now. There's no need for that," Alistair protested, shifting instinctively into a defensive stance even as he raised his empty sword hand in a peaceful gesture.

"They're not blood mages. Uldred didn't break them," Elissa said with stern certainty.

"You can't know that," argued Cullen. "Then could be faking- waiting until our guards are down."

"We can't take that chance," said Ratth.

"We aren't killing them for something they haven't done," Elissa insisted. The tension between the templars and the rest tightened around them. They were outnumbered by the mages even if they'd had more time to catch their breath. Forced to choose, Bethana would defend Cullen even if she didn't agree with him.

"Perhaps we should take this to the Knight-Commander," she said, sending a quick prayer to the Maker that he was the sort of templar capable of being objective when it came to mages. Her suggestion received doubtful looks from most of the room, but Erik studied her a moment and when he lowered his sword, the other templars reluctantly followed suit. They did not, however, loosen their grips on their weapons.

"Agreed," he said.

Elissa nodded her approval and Alistair sighed his relief before finally coming down the last few stairs.

"If we're all done threatening each other with death and dismemberment, perhaps we could get moving?" the wardens' elven companion suggested cheerfully. "I can think of far more pleasant places to spend the night."

In short order they were all organized into a loose formation- the wardens were careful to keep some of their own group between the mages who had been in the Harrowing chamber and the suspicious templars at all times- and headed down the tower stairs. One of the templars, Len, had yet to speak, but he allowed his comrades to guide him.

Bethana couldn't keep her gaze from wandering frequently to Cullen, but he paid her little mind. When he wasn't lost in thought, looking haunted by the death and destruction they passed, he was occupied with watching the senior enchanters with dark, wary eyes. She made herself keep her distance. As a result she ended up trailing at the back of the group.

She was a little startled to find herself a short time later walking beside Wynne. The older woman's clear curiosity and shrewd eyes made her nervous.

"Who are you? I know you're not from this circle," the older woman said bluntly. "Why are you here?"

"I'm nosy," she answered shortly. Then she became aware that some of the others were beginning to pay attention to their conversation. She bit back a groan and repeated her story. "My name is Bethana. I could feel how thin the Veil was becoming here and having obvious issues with self-preservation instincts, I decided to investigate."

Wynne didn't look nearly as convinced as Bethana would like. "You just happened to be passing by. Alone," the older woman stated with a lift of her grey brow. "Is that the story you intend to tell the Knight-Commander?"

Bethana flinched, nearly missing one of the stairs she was walking down. _Right. I'm an apostate with no title or official purpose to hide behind. They're going to lock me away. Or try to,_ she thought. Her strength and magic were trickling back slowly. She might have enough to shape-shift and flee before they reached the base of the tower. Maybe.

"I hadn't really thought that far ahead," she admitted, somewhat ruefully. "But yes." _If I can't escape before then._

Wynne hummed. "You know," she said, deceptively casual, "someone with enough fortitude to survive this might be useful to the wardens." That was enough to garner stares from said wardens walking ahead of them as well as Bethana, not that Wynne acknowledged their surprise. "You might be able to avoid being locked up in the tower as well as do some good for Ferelden."

"But she's an apostate," Alistair protested to Bethana's surprise. A decade into the future he hadn't seemed to have any problems with mages; he'd gone out of his way to help them in fact, at least until they'd all but handed Redcliffe over to Magister Alexius. Alistair's cheeks flushed a little. "No offense."

"I was under the impression that you need all the help you can get," Wynne said mildly.

"We did come here because we need mages' help," Elissa said, eying Bethana speculatively.

 _It would get me out of here without having to shape-shift and flee,_ Bethana thought. She frowned a little to herself, darting a glance towards Cullen. Her heart told her to stay as close to him as she could, but he would be leaving for Kirkwall before too long- unless she'd changed a great deal more than she thought she had- and she didn't want to be trapped in the Ferelden circle when that happened. _Of course, if I go with the wardens I'm basically signing up to help them fight their war. Is that what I want: another war? If I fled I could go look for Corypheus instead, or Solas' artifacts._

But Bethana had gotten used to being in the center of Thedas' troubles, and the thought of not helping where she could was too hard to swallow. There would be time for artifact hunting later, surely, if Solas was still sleeping.

They'd gone down another floor before Bethana spoke again.

"If you're willing to keep company with an apostate, then I'm willing to help in anyway I can," she said.

Wynne's smile turned satisfied even as the Qunari's turned sour. Elissa and Alistair exchanged a glance before the later sighed and Elissa looked back with a grim little smile.

"Welcome to the team," said the future queen.


	12. Ferelden - Down and Out

Ferelden:

Down and Out

* * *

The journey out of the tower was tense, to say the least. Both the mages and the templars hovered between collapse and paranoid aggression. With every floor they found more bodies of people the tower inhabitants had known, people they had grown up with and trained with- people who had been life-long friends. Most were unrecognizable, but a few made one or another of their broken little group react with grief and anger, eating away at their sanity just a little bit more. The worst, by far, were the lower floors where the adolescents and children had lived- and died.

They picked up a tranquil along the way and a frightened mage hidden in a wardrobe. Bethana was happy to see other survivors, though the templars watched the mage with dark suspicion.

They were on the ground floor when they heard the quiet murmur of voices up ahead. The templars and mages that had staffs grabbed them. Bethana followed suit, though her brief flare of adrenaline was already fading as she realized that the wardens' group looked relieved instead of worried.

"It's all right," Wynne assured briskly. "It's the children. When I realized what was happening, I erected a shield to protect those I could." She hurried forward to check on her students and the rest of them followed with varying degrees of hope and reluctance written across their faces.

For Bethana, at least, it felt a little like finally waking from a long nightmare to walk around the corner and see Wynne surrounded by lively, almost entirely unharmed children. Several of them exclaimed and rushed over when they spotted Flura and Trum. The latter promptly burst into tears and was promptly enfolded in an older student's arms. Flura's lips trembled, but she pressed them together and refused to cry. Behind them Erik watched the scene with abject relief. The other templars seemed to be holding onto their wariness, but most of their swords had found their ways back into their sheathes.

Bethana hung back as the wardens went to greet their own companions: a joyful mabari and a young, smiling Leliana who hugged the wardens without reserve. She swatted the elf when he offered the same with open arms and what was a very suggestive remark if the red blush creeping across Alistair's neck was any indication. Leliana's tinkling laughter was more carefree than Bethana had ever heard it, far from the sharper, cynical humor that her spy-master had displayed in the future. Ten years and the death of the Devine had changed a great deal.

 _Well of course it did,_ Bethana chided herself as the others began to usher First Enchanter Irving over to the door to speak to the templars on the other side. _I can't expect anyone to be the same as they were when I left them. A decade is a long time, and it was an eventful decade at that._

Alistair pounded on the large wooden door with an armored fist; the rest of the room grew quiet at the sound.

"Knight-Commander!" he yelled, thumping on the door again. "We're back! Open the door." There was a low murmur of voices on the other side, then silence. Alistair waited a minute before knocking again. "Knight-Commander!"

"I told you-" a voice growled from behind the door.

"Greagoir," the First Enchanter cut in quietly. The templar leader when silent. "Perhaps I can reassure you that these young people have indeed succeeded in destroying the threat. It is safe to open the door."

Silence again. Alistair raised his fist as though to pound on the door again, and Irving lifted a hand to stop him, voicelessly requesting patience. A moment later there was a scraping sound and a thunk on the other side of the door, then it was cautiously drawn open. A dozen templars stood ready on the other side, braced for whatever came out of the tower. Stark disbelief swept across their faces as the weary group of battered survivors shuffled through. Then one of the templars- the Knight Commander by the style of his armor- stepped forward and grasped Irving's hand in obvious relief.

"It is good to see you alive, old friend," he said. "I had feared-"

Irving nodded solemnly. "It was far too near a thing," he admitted.

The other templars recovered from their astonishment enough to help Ratth, Len, Erik and Cullen over to their medics before doing the same for the mages- though they watched their charges warily. They left the wardens' group alone. They left Bethana alone as well, perhaps assuming that she'd been with them all along- at least until Greagoir saw her.

The Knight-Commander's eyes narrowed. "Who is that? She didn't come in with you," he demanded in a low voice. Elissa & Wynne were willing to explain, and Bethana was content to let them argue her fate. She was caught up in watching Cullen as surreptitiously as possible, trying to soak up what would likely be her last sight of him for some time. The exhaustion and all she'd been through in the past twenty-four hours lent a sense of surreality to everything, making her emotions fragile and convoluted in the moments they weren't altogether numb. She needed sleep and as loathe as she was to leave Cullen, being away from the young, brittle version of him would likely help her emotions stabilize as well.

"How thrilling to have two more beautiful women joining us," the blond said, startling Bethana a little.

She knew better than to ignore her surroundings so thoroughly. She frowned a little and let the skepticism show plainly on her face when she looked at him. His words sounded sincere- smooth, confident, inviting- but aside from sleep, she knew the thing she needed most was a bath. She know she was a mess; sweat and gore made her robes stick to her skin unpleasantly and though her sense of smell had dulled out of self-preservation early on, she was sure she smelled like death. To be honest, though, the elf didn't look any better. None of them did.

"I don't think I caught your name," she said after a moment, deciding to ignore his flirting but not him.

"Zevran Arainai, at your service," he said, sweeping a fluid bow then lifting his head to offer a charming grin.

"Nice to meet you," she said. _I think._ The name tugged vaguely at her memory, but she couldn't place it. In all likelihood she'd simply heard him named in the Hero of Ferelden's list of companions.

"Fine!" the Knight-Commander said, pulling her attention away. He sounded more tired than upset, though his expression when he looked at Bethana had lost none of its suspicion. "I hope you know what you're doing," he told Elissa.

The warden nodded an acknowledgment, strain around her eyes. "We need to get going." Her gaze swept over the others before she turned and headed for the door, clearly expecting them to follow without argument.

Bethana hesitated a moment longer, her gaze seeking out Cullen. This time he was looking at her as well. Her heart jolted in her chest as their eyes met, for the first time since the change without animosity or suspicion. For once brief, precious moment she felt like he saw her- really saw _her_ , not her magic or the threat she might present, but _her_.

The moment passed- he looked away and she had to leave- but she wrapped her hopes around the memory and kept it close to her heart.


	13. Ferelden - Ever Onward

Ferelden:

Ever Onward

* * *

"Surely we can spare a few hours for sleep," Leliana said as the group got out of the boat that had taken them across the lake and immediately started walking towards the dusty road. She gave her companions a furtive glanced. "And baths."

"Are you saying we stink?" Alistair demanded with completely faked offense. Leliana wrinkled her nose at him.

"I want a bath as much as anyone," Elissa said, "but we've been at the tower for a lot longer than we planned. We left them to deal with a demon without us; we need to get back to Redcliffe as soon as possible."

Bethana, who had been rather lost in her own thoughts as they left the tower, started paying closer attention.

"I probably should have asked this earlier, but were you at the tower to get help against more than just the Blight?" she asked.

The look Wynne gave her was all too knowing. "A bit distracted were you?

Bethana did her best not to blush- not an easy task with her fair skin.

"Do you know what happened at Ostagar?" Elissa asked after taking a moment to figure out where to begin. Bethana gave a solemn nod. "No matter what the rumors say, the Grey Warden were not at fault. Logain betrayed us. We found ourselves rather short on allies after that and went to Arl Eamon of Redcliffe in hopes that he could help. Unfortunately all we found were more problems. He fell ill some time ago-"

"He was poisoned on Loghain's orders," Alistair growled, his face twisted in hatred. It was a startling expression on someone who was usually so jovial.

Elissa's lips pursed but she continued almost mildly. "His son, as it turns out, was a mage in hiding, and he made a deal with a demon to save his father.

"What kind of deal?" asked Bethana.

"The kind that ends with the boy possessed and corpses rising to attack the living in Redcliffe," Elissa answered grimly.

"After everything you faced and defeated at the tower, I take it your needs are more complicated than a request for extra hands to kill demons."

"Connor is just a child who tried something foolish to save someone he loves," Leliana spoke up in defense of their plans. "We didn't want to kill him if we didn't have to."

"He isn't fully possessed," Elissa explained. "His tutor believes that we might be able to save him if we go into the Fade and kill the demon there, but to do that we needed more mages."

"That's... quite the task," Bethana said.

Zevran chuckled and flashed a sharp smile. "It has become something of a routine. It seems there is noone willing to help the wardens fight the Blight until we do something for them first."

Elissa grimaced in agreement. "To be fair, they do usually **need** help, but it would be nice if, on occasion, it occurred to people that we're **already** in over our heads trying to save them."

"But if we can save Arl Eamon, he could be a big help," Alistair said, looking a little anxious and uneasy. "He was Cailan's uncle- he's practically next in line for the throne, he has soldiers still able to fight and enough influence to help turn people against Loghain."

Elissa reached out and put her hand on his arm. "We'll do our best to save him. I gave my word," she assured quietly, her whole manner suddenly subtly softer. The tension drained out of Alistair, and he shot her a grateful little smile with such shy sincerity that Bethana felt like an intruder just watching.

It didn't last more than a moment; a few steps later they were more than an arm's length apart and back to normal. Bethana glanced at the others to see if they'd noticed that. Sten's expression hadn't changed in the least, but Leliana looked pleased and Zevran looked amused. Wynne, however, was studying the pair with slightly narrowed eyes, her mouth pressed into a thin line.

"The Fade is a dangerous place," Bethana mused aloud in an attempt to keep things on track. She was confused by the wry looks that the others exchanged.

"We found that out once already," Elissa admitted. "There was a sloth demon in the tower that dragged us into the Fade. Not the most pleasant experience."

"Really? What happened?" Leliana asked eagerly- equal measures of concern and curiosity.

The others told her what Bethana suspected was a very abridged version of what had happened. She wasn't sorry to have missed that. The conversation began to trail off soon after as fatigue weighed heavier and heavier on all of them. Bethana wished the templars had been willing to let them borrow the boat long enough to take them all the way to Redcliffe, but they only had two and the Knight-Commander understandably hadn't wanted to be stranded on the island while sending the mages off in the other boat. They would have to meet them there.

Bethana swallowed her complaints and focused on putting one foot in front of the other. It was going to be a long walk to Redcliffe.


	14. Ferelden - Redcliffe

Ferelden:

Redcliffe

* * *

Despite signs of what must have been a difficult battle and the faint scent of burnt flesh that lingered in the air, the village of Redcliffe was a most welcome sight. Only the Mabari had retained his boundless energy, frequently running circles around them all. The rest of the group trudged along wearily. Bethana's legs were shaking and threatening to give out altogether if she pushed herself too much further by the time they made it there. That last hill was almost too much. She thanked the Maker that the journey had been entirely uneventful. Her magic was recovering - sluggishly, but recovering. Fatigued though she was, she no longer felt quite so hollowed out inside where the warm thrum of her power resided.

The group bypassed the town and headed straight for the castle where they were welcomed by the guards and immediately shown to the main hall.

"Alistair!"

Bethana watched with bemusement as the future Arl Teagan greeted Alistair and Elissa with genuine warmth and relief.

 _Either the years completely eroded his good humor, or he must have_ _ **really**_ _disliked the Inquisition,_ she mused, remembering all too well the stubborn distrust of the man who had been a driving force behind the Inquisition's disbanding. She'd never imagined him to have warm, easy-going side.

"The mages arrived shortly ahead of you," Teagan said. "They explained a little about what happened at the tower. I know you must be tired, but... Connor isn't doing very well. I'm not sure he can wait much longer."

There was only a brief moment of exhaustion-born hesitation from Elissa before she gave a resolute nod.

"Of course," she said. "We'd best take care of it now."

"More stairs," Zevran groaned.

Putting duty above want was nothing new. Bethana followed the wardens and Teagan without audible protest up the stairs and down several corridors. They reached a large, richly-furbished sitting room at last and found not only the mages and a handful of guards waiting for them, but Morrigan as well. Bethana froze briefly in the doorway, but no one was paying enough attention to her to notice.

She'd known, of course, that Morrigan had traveled with Leliana and the Hero of Ferelden, but she hadn't know the details. When she hadn't been at the tower, Bethana had assumed that Morrigan had either left or not yet joined the group.

 _Maybe I'll get to finish my shape-shifting lessons after all,_ she thought.

"We have brought lyrium and begun preparations for the ritual," First Enchanter Irving said without wasting time on niceties. He looked better than he had in the tower but very worn. He probably wanted to get things over with as much as they did so that he could finally rest. "We can start anytime."

"I'm glad we're doing this," Alistair murmured. "If we can save Connor, well, it's better for everyone, isn't it. I owe Arl Eamon this much, and I'm glad we didn't..." He cleared his throat uncomfortably. He really was incapable of hiding his emotions; gratitude, worry, discomfort and hope were written clearly across his face. "I'm glad it all worked out this way."

"We haven't saved the boy yet," the First Enchanter warned. "No one is safe until that demon is cut off from him, preferably dead."

Elissa shot Alistair a reassuring smile then turned solemn eyes on Irving. "Any last minute advice?"

"What you will face truly depends on what type of demon is involved, but this one sounds like a demon of greed and desire. It will likely engage you in dialog and try to tempt you with an offer. Do not accept, no matter what it says. Making deals with demons never turns out well," Irving warned, his voice gravelly and grave. "Now, we haven't sufficient lyruim to send more than one mage into the Fade. Who are you going to send?"

Elissa's gaze flickered over them all as faint traces of unease flickered across her face. Bethana wondered if that was because she was worried about sending someone into a dangerous situation alone, or whether she was worried that she could not trust them to resist temptation. Perhaps both. The only mages in the room who had not suffered or spent their strength fighting recently were Morrigan and Jowan. The latter had already proven untrustworthy, according to what Bethana had been told, and the former... Bethana rather liked Morrigan, but she had always gotten the feeling that Morrigan would do what she felt was best for **her** regardless of how it affected anyone else, her son being the only exception.

The warden's gaze settled on Wynne. The older mage likely could have handled it just fine, but there was something far past fatigue in her eyes, something that made Bethana remember Faith's words about her falling. Before she could even sort out exactly why she felt the need to speak, the words were already past Bethana's lips.

"I've faced a desire demon before," she said, "during my Harrowing." They all turned to look at her, and Bethana lifted her chin a fraction rather than shifting uneasily like part of her wanted to do. It wasn't a lie, though she had to bend the truth a little for it to make sense to them. She could, in a way, picture her entire time as the Inquisitor as one long Harrowing.

"You're willing to face one again?" Elissa asked, her eyes narrowing a little.

It was a strange thing to volunteer for; had she truly still been a student in the Circle she likely would have kept her mouth shut. But she wasn't that young mage any longer; she was the Inquisitor, even if she was the only mortal left who knew it.

"Yes," Bethana said simply.

The others exchanged glances, and Alistair looked uneasy. "No offense, but we don't really know you-" he started.

"I think we should let her try," Wynne spoke up. Alistair quieted in the face of her calm certainty. "Give her a chance to prove herself."

Elissa studied them both with sharp eyes- perhaps aware that there was something more going on- but when no one else protested, she nodded slowly.

"Very well," Irving said. "Let us get the ritual underway, then. It's best if you make yourself comfortable." He waved a hand at a nearby chaise lounge.

It felt strangely vulnerable to lie down while everyone else remained standing. Bethana's fingers curled around her staff, holding it against her chest while the mages all gathered around her, each of them carefully cradling lyrium crystals in gloved hands. They started chanting and magic swelled around Bethana- a warm weight in the air that soon coaxed her deep beneath its currents. She didn't notice when her eyes closed or when she breached the Veil. Between one breath and the next she simply found herself standing in the Fade.

"This is not terribly unlike Nightmare's corner of the Fade," she said aloud to break the strange silence that pressed against her ears. "A little more drab." _A little more lonely._ Bethana shook her head and started forward, accepting that there was nothing she could do at the moment to remedy the ache that came from missing her companions.

As she turned the first corner of the uneven, floating pathways of the Fade, the silence fled, leaving echoes and whispers in its wake. Pale shadows, either lesser spirits or illusions, wandered aimlessly around her; the voice of a frightened boy calling to his father, and that of a man frantically calling for Connor drifted first from one of them then another. They didn't seem to notice Bethana as she walked past them- or through them.

Up on a hill stood what looked like a solid, human man surrounded by echoes of reality: a trio of bookshelves, a bed, and a stool. He looked anxious and lost, and when Bethana approached cautiously, he called out to her.

"You there! Have you seen my son? I can... I can hear him, but I cannot find him. This blasted fog has me turning in circles!" the man said, clearly as tired and worried as he was frustrated.

Bethana studied him a moment, standing carefully out of reach. "Arl Eamon?" she asked. _A spirit?_ she wondered silently. _A trap? The real man dreaming?_ So long as he asked nothing from her that she was not already committed to, perhaps it didn't matter.

"I- Yes. Who are you? Have you seen my son?"

"I'm still looking for him," she admitted. "He made a mistake with a demon."

"A demon!" he exclaimed. His alarm was convincing enough that she cautiously decided he might truly be Eamon himself. "We have to help him! Is that... is that why you're here?" His eyes searched hers desperately.

"It is. If I put an end to the demon, Connor should be safe."

Eamon hesitated just a moment longer, perhaps feeling the weight of leaving his son's life in a stranger's hands. "Please. Find him. Save him. I... I will do anything I can, but... The world feels strange and hazy. The fog, I can never see through it. I fear I will only slow you down."

 _Perhaps that is part of the demon's trap,_ she thought. Bethana nodded solemnly.

"I will do everything I can for your son," she said. She meant it too. She remembered now the young man she had met on the docks of Redcliffe during her time as the Inquisitor: his haunted eyes, the bitter shame he couldn't hide. He'd never forgiven himself for what happened with the desire demon. Perhaps she couldn't change that, but she would try her best regardless. Cole might have some ideas about how to ease his pain and guilt if she could find a way to introduce them.

It was a problem for a later time. Bethana left Eamon behind and waded back into the sea of pale, people-shaped echoes. Soon she found another path. It led her up a hill which did not slow her steps- all of the fatigue she'd felt in reality was gone.

At the top of the hill stood a young boy. He looked frightened and human, but Bethana approached him cautiously.

"Who are you?" he demanded. "Are you the one who made Father ill? Tell me now!" The indignance didn't quite fit the worry drawn into his brows, and a faint frown tugged at Bethana's lips.

"I am not. Connor..." _If that's who you are,_ she thought, "do you know where you are?"

"What do you mean? I'm home, in Redcliffe. Where else would I be?"

"You remember that your father fell ill. You tried to fix it, do you remember that?" The words were mild, more gentle than an accusation, but Conner's expression darkened immediately.

"I did what I had to," he said.

"The demon who made the deal with you has been causing trouble in Redcliffe. It has to stop."

"You don't understand anything!" he shouted. "Leave us alone!" The little boy's voice began to take on a strange, echoing overtone. Then, as his anger surged and overflowed, he doubled over as though in pain. His image flickered and with a groan the form of a desire demon replaced Connor. Without another word, the creature attacked.

Bethana was ready. She struck quickly, flinging a fire spell from the tip of her staff. The desire demon shrieked and tried to rake her clawed fingers across Bethana's face, but she ducked and shoved an ice spell towards the demon's unguarded ribs. Then, with a growled threat, the desire demon suddenly disappeared. Bethana, halfway through another swing of her staff, nearly lost her balance when she found herself without an opponent.

"You're running?" she demanded of the air, startled and irritated by the sudden change. There was no reply. Bethana pushed a few wayward strands of hair out of her face with a huff. "That won't get rid of me," she said aloud in case the demon was still listening. _I suppose I should have known better than to expect a straight forward fight, but I would like to get this over with so I can take that darn bath._

She made her way back down the hill and wandered through the sea of ghost-like people until she caught sight of something solid from the corner of her eye. Once more she approached what looked like a normal little boy.

"Connor-" she started to speak.

"Why are you trying to hurt me?" the boy interrupted. "Why are you trying to stop me?"

Bethana bit back the immediate denial and reassurance that rose to the tip of her tongue. She couldn't be sure whether there was anything of the real Connor in the figure in front of her. If it was only the demon, there would be no reasoning with it. Even if part of the boy was awake in there, he was already under the demon's sway. There was no point in arguments.

"I will save Conner," she said with calm, quiet certainty, willing the truth of her words to become reality in the malleable fabric of the Fade. She wasn't sure it would help- there was still a lot she didn't understand about the Fade- but it couldn't hurt. "This is over. It doesn't matter how many times you retreat; I will not stop."

Arrogance and anger twisted the boy's face into an ugly expression then quickly morphed into the face and form of the desire demon. "You're in my domain now. You cannot win. Trespasser," it hissed, "I will drive you out!"

The desire demon shrieked; the ground behind her bubbled with heat and out of it crawled several rage demons. The desire demon vanished after being barely grazed by another fire spell, leaving the lesser demons to fight in its place.

A dozen ice spells and a couple of unfortunate burns later, the rage demons were gone and Bethana was stalking down the pathways of the Fade again. The pale 'ghosts' were gone, and it was eerie to hear only her own footsteps and breathing as she walked. It took longer to find the desire demon the third time. Bethana found it waiting for her at the end of a path in it's own scantily clad skin, having given up the disguise at last.

"Oh, very well. No more illusions. But you stand in my domain. It is here I am most powerful, and yet I have no wish to engage your power." The demon's smile was sultry and inviting, but the look in its eyes was dangerous. "Nor should you be so eager to engage mine." Its tone softened. "Perhaps we should converse instead."

"No deals. No negotiations," Bethana said. "You should have left the mortal world alone."

The demon sneered. "Very well, then. If you wish a battle, you will have it. Let us see if your power matches your boldness, creature."

A blast of power and flame accompanied her words, and Bethana had to pull up a quick shield lest she be turned to cinders. The desire demon was right- it was its domain and it was powerful- but though Bethana was in her younger, inexperienced body, she **remembered** being strong, and that mattered a whole lot more in the Fade than it ever had in reality. Her magic flared and the flames were brushed aside. The desire demon's eyes widened, and the former/future Inquisitor grinned.


	15. Ferelden - Least of Her Worries

Ferelden:

Wherein Demons are the Least of Her Worries

* * *

Bethana was not, as a general rule, someone who sought out violence on purpose. She like peace and diplomacy, though not politics. That said, it was surprisingly cathartic to blast the desire demon from one end of their makeshift fighting ring to the other. She took several hits herself, but nothing that really slowed her down. She got the feeling that the desire demon was not used to fighting head on, and she used that inexperience to her advantage as often as possible. In addition, there was noone around to protect, so she could use lightning as often as she liked, work on her control, and poor every ounce of frustration she'd been repressing since Solas ran off into attacks meant to fry her opponent.

"No! You can't! The boy is mine!" the desire demon panted. It looked decidedly singed as it climbed to its feet with narrowed eyes. "I'll give you anything else you want. Money. Men. Women. Power-"

"Your prices are too high," Bethana said. She was panting as well, but the magic was singing in her blood. She reached out a hand towards the demon and lightning followed. Desire screamed, its body jerking in the shower of blinding light, then it slumped to the ground, dead.

"That was quite the display of brute force," said an unreadable voice that was all too familiar.

The air around Bethana crackled with leftover magic, but even as she spun to face the intruder, she knew that whatever power she had, it wouldn't be enough.

"Solas."

He stood at the edge of the path with his hands tucked behind his back and a infuriatingly calm expression painted across his face. One eyebrow lifted slightly at her gasp, but he seemed otherwise unmoved.

"Inquisitor," he greeted, immediately dashing any hopes she'd had that he was the Solas from the past whom she might have been able to handle.

"What are you doing here?" she demanded.

"'Here' as in the Fade, or 'here' as in the past?" he asked. "Because I rather expected you to know the answer already."

Bethana's mouth pressed into a thin line. "You were too close to the amulet," she said. "I brought you back with me."

"Indeed," he said, raising a brow in unimpressed disapproval. "In fact, you may find that I, along with the two benevolent spirits, may not be all that you brought back with you. You swept through time like a raging storm; there's no telling what damage you might have left in your wake."

"What is that supposed to mean?" she asked. Perhaps he didn't know, or perhaps he was too angry with her to answer so easily. She had, after all, undone all his hard work. "Is that why you're here: to lecture me?" Bethana's stance shifted slightly into something more defensive. The fact that Solas' staff was still strapped to his back was hardly comforting; he likely wouldn't need it to crush her. "Or to stop me?"

"I am not here to fight," he said flatly, expression twisting minutely.

"No?" Bethana studied him a little more closely. "Why not?" There was that twitch again. _What is that? Irritation? Frustration? ...Worry?_ "You certainly didn't hesitate to try to kill me the last time."

"Your death was not what I wanted."

"No," she could admit that now that her own fury had calmed, "but I am as much in your way now as I was then. Why wouldn't you try it again? What's changed?"

"You are no more a threat than you have ever been. I can afford to wait, to give you time. Use it. **Live**. Cease this pointless struggle; you cannot stop me," he said. He sounded convincing, mostly, but she was too caught up in putting the pieces together to be offended or argue.

Solas had been affected by the same spell that puled her back- or rather, pulled her soul back. Her mind was full of new memories and knowledge, but physically her body was in the exact same state it had been in 10 years before the Inquisition. Her stamina and power were no where near what they had been in the future. If it was the same for Solas...

Realization swept over her. It must have shown her face because Solas tensed.

"You're still sleeping, weakened from creating the Veil." Bethana's defensive stance fell away as she stared at him. "You don't have any of the power you regained. You aren't even awake. You're helpless outside the Fade." He might still have power within the Fade, but she could feel the spell that held her there fading. All she had to do to escape him was wake.

Solas' chin lifted minutely as something cold and dark shadowed his eyes. "Planning on hunting me down, Inquisitor?"

She could. It would be difficult, but hardly impossible. Solas hadn't woken until a year before the conclave was attacked; she had time to find him. She could keep him from ever touching the Veil. She could protect her friends; she could protect Cullen. But... she tried to imagine finding him sleeping and helpless and sliding a dagger across his throat and abruptly felt ill. She couldn't hide the revulsion she felt at the thought. Something eased in his expression when he saw it, and she caught a glimmer of the elf who had once been a friend and comrade.

No, she couldn't kill him, not even after what he'd done- or tried to do.

"There has to be another way," she said. "Some way to wake your people, to... to create a sanctuary for the elves who want to return to the old ways, some way to rebuild the land between here and the Fade without destroying the entire population of Thedas and without killing our friends. You were so certain that you were doing what was necessary- Did you even look for another way?"

"Of course I did!" he snapped, looking as flustered as she'd ever seen him- flustered enough that she wasn't sure she believed him.

"For how long? How hard did you really try to save the world that you said yourself seemed like little more than a bad dream to you? Did you ever really even believe that it was **worth** saving?"

"I-" Solas wasn't meeting her eyes any longer, but the signs of stubbornness folded into the corners of his mouth and the furrow of his brow only deepened. "There **is** no other way. I knew when I built the Veil that undoing it would destroy everything and that the world have to start anew. It was always a last resort. It was not a decision that I made lightly."

"But it is a decision that you made alone," Bethana said. The look Solas gave her was troubled, then he looked away again. Silence stretched between them.

"You can't understand," he said in time. The coldness in his voice was gone. "You never saw the way it was; you cannot know how broken the world has become. The damage I did when I created the Veil... The elves in Thedas are little more than sad shadows of what my people once were. They cower at the feet of the men who oppress them or cling so tightly to the false gods that I gave up everything to free them from that they might as well still be their slaves! They have forgotten; they have lost themselves."

"There are other ways to help the elves find themselves again," Bethana said. "Teach them the truth of what happened them. They won't all listen, but some will. Find a place for them to rebuild, to be free of humans or to stand on even ground with them. Show them that they can be better. Protect them until they're strong enough to stand on their own."

Solas was already shaking his head.

"You've given up on your own people," Bethana accused. He flinched at that, then stilled. "Tearing down the Veil- it's a short cut. You'd rather start all over than work with those who are already here because it's easier, not because it is the right thing to do."

"You don't care about what is right for my people," Solas argued. "You're just trying to save your own."

"Can't I do both?" she asked. He frowned at her. "Give me time to **try**. Give me a chance to show you that there is worth in this world and in the elves that remain." When that didn't seem enough to sway him, she stepped closer. "You accuse these elves of clinging to history so hard that they cannot grow past it, but is what you're doing so different? Do you want things back the way they were so much that you'll refuse to see any potential in what can be built from that which is here now?"

The spell anchoring her to the Fade was naught but fragile threads by then. She clung to the world of dreams by her own will rather than the will of the mages back in Redcliffe. She was tiring, but she needed an answer.

"Solas, please. Give them a chance. Try with me. Let us be allies once more," she said.

"Sometimes something must be lost in order for anything to survive. Diseased branches must be trimmed for a tree to have any chance. You cannot fix everything, Inquisitor."

"I can try. Let me try."

There was a long silence. Then a quiet, weary sigh accompanied the slight slouch of his shoulders. "I... will consider what you have said."

 _That's a lousy attempt at avoiding promises and you know it,_ she thought. _But I think that's the best I'm going to get right now. I can't hold on to the Fade much longer._

"I won't give up," Bethana said. The spell began to fail, and she felt herself waking. Her sight went hazy, but she caught a glimmer of longing in Solas' tired, stormy grey eyes. "Not on Thedas, and not on you."

The Fade let her go, and Bethana woke in Redcliffe.


	16. Ferelden - Foolishness

Ferelden:

Foolishness

* * *

Bethana woke completely undamaged aside from a slight headache to find that Connor had woken before her. The mages had stayed long enough to check him over thoroughly and hear Bethana's report of the demon's death, but they had all agreed that he seemed fine. Then the exhausted mages had left for the tower with their templar escorts. None of them had tried to take the boy, but the First Enchanter had drawn Teagan aside before they left. Bethana doubted it would be long before they sent someone to pick up the young mage. She couldn't imagine anyone would argue after such a violent lesson in why proper training was so important for mages and the reason why they needed the Circles.

"Our task is not done yet," Bann Teagan spoke after both he and Isode had expressed their relief and gratitude. Bethana swallowed her impatience: she still hadn't gotten a bath or a meal or any proper sleep. But their situation was rather dire; she couldn't much blame them for overlooking the group's fatigue. Much. The wardens, Zevran and Sten had cleaned themselves up a bit, but it didn't look like they'd gotten any food or rest while she had been in the Fade either.

"Whatever the demon did to my brother, it seems to have spared his life... but he remains comatose. We cannot wake him."

"The Urn! The Urn of Sacred Ashes will save Eamon," Isolde insisted loudly. Teagan looked doubtful, and Bethana heard a scoff of disbelief from more than one their companions, but Alistair turned pleading eyes on Elissa. The female warden pursed her lips but nodded in the end.

"Very well," Elissa said. "We will attempt to find the Urn, but in exchange, Bann Teagan, Arlessa, we need your words that we will have your support against the Blight and Logain regardless of whether we succeed." She received subdued agreements from them both. "We can start out tomorrow. We need time to recover," she added.

"Of course!" Isode agreed. "We will have the servants draw you baths and get you fresh clothes. We'll have dinner served soon. You have my eternal gratitude for your efforts to help restore my husband. If there is anything we can do for you, you need only ask."

Zevran muttered something cheerful in reply too quietly for Isolde to hear. Leliana, who was next to him, blushed and elbowed him sharply.

"Brother Genitivi in Denerim may be able to help you. He has researching the Urn's location for several years now," Isolde said as she ushered them down a hallway towards their rooms. "None of our knights were able to find Genitivi, but perhaps the Maker will lead you to him."

Not everyone shared her stubborn hope.

"We can't really be considering taking time to search for a **miracle** , can we?" Morrigan asked, spitting out the word with derision. Fortunately they were at the back of the group and out of Isolde's hearing range. "This is ridiculous. The ashes of some dead lunatic are useless. If magic cannot cure the Arl, then he is dead. It is far past time to move on."

Having been to Haven, Bethana had heard all of the stories about how the Hero of Fereldan had in fact found the ashes and saved the Arl, but she couldn't exactly say that.

"So you don't believe in Andraste?" she asked Morrigan. "Do you believe in the Maker?"

"Of course not," the other mage scoffed, studying Bethana with dark, calculating eyes. "They are nothing but silly stories meant to keep children in line and comfort cowards in the dark."

 _Goodness, she's not one to mince words, is she?_ Bethana thought. _Not that she ever was, but somewhere along the way she learned to soften her sharp edges enough to survive in the Orlesian court. That's no small feat._

"I believe," Bethana said mildly, curious to hear Morrigan's response.

"Then you are a fool," the witch said with near-disgust.

It probably shouldn't have made her smile, but it did. She thought of all dark times her faith had carried her through, all the times she had questioned the truth, all the times she thought that all was lost only to be proven wrong. She thought of Varric and miracles and a whole camp of refugees singing their assurance in the coming dawn. Bethana shrugged a little.

"There are worse things to be."


	17. Ferelden - Interlude

Interlude

* * *

Though not all of them were joining in the search for the Sacred Ashes, most of those who were staying behind had little interest in remaining in Redcliffe, so after one blissful night in real beds, they all headed for their main camp. Bethana trailed along behind them, watching them tell stories and jokes, bicker and flirt and plan. The people who traveled with the wardens were nearly as varied as those who had made up the inner circle of the Inquisition. She didn't think the group melded quite as well her own had, but perhaps she was biased. Her group had its issues too, after all.

She missed their issues.

An arm was thrown over her shoulder before melancholy could take hold. Ice magic rose instinctively to the tips of her fingers but faded before she cast anything; it was only Zevran. Then his hands wandered a bit too freely and she flicked a spark of electricity at him after all.

"Watch those hands," she warned, making an effort to keep the amusement from her voice.

"Ah, cara mia, forgive me," he said. He didn't sound very sorry at all. He winced a little at the shock and his hand stopped wandering though. "Completely unintentional, I assure you."

"Uh-huh," she said.

"If you want him to leave you alone, perhaps you should not be so lenient with him. You are a mage, are you not?" Morrigan asked, eying them both with a touch of disdain- and, if one looked very, very closely, a hint of curiosity. "You can't be much of one if you can't make him go away."

"I'm not trying to drive him off, Morrigan, I just want to make sure he knows that I have boundaries," Bethana said. She gave Zevran a pointed look and he shrugged, removing his arm from her shoulders in the process.

"You cannot blame me for trying. Surrounded by all of these delicious young women; what man would not be tempted?" His mouth curved into an inviting grin; a warm sort of wickedness sparked in his eyes. To be completely honest, if Bethana hadn't given her heart away long ago, she might very well have been tempted to flirt back, even knowing it was a bad idea. He was awfully charming in his way. Perhaps he saw something in her eyes, for he leaned a little closer. "For that matter, you are surrounded by quite impressive specimens as well- if I do say so myself. You cannot be unaware. Are you not tempted yourself?"

Bethana shook her head. "Sorry, Zevran. You're not my type."

"Male?" he asked, his grin widening. Ahead of them Alistair choked on nothing and coughed. Something darker flickered in Zevran's eyes though his smirk didn't change at all. "An elf?"

 _'Not Cullen,'_ she thought. "A flirt," she said aloud, offering a lopsided smile of her own. "You leave the impression that you're not exactly looking for a long term commitment."

"You wound me, my beauty. Such cruel assumptions," Zevran said with all the necessary drama. Whatever hint of seriousness had been his eyes vanished so completely that she wondered if she'd imagined it.

"I know. I'm a terrible person," Bethana agreed easily.

Zevran soon moved on to flirting mercilessly with Wynne, who was less than amused. Bethana considered taking the opportunity to edge closer to Morrigan, but what she really wanted from the other mage was lessons in shapeshifting, and she couldn't ask for that. There was no reason she should know about Morrigan's abilities in the current timeline. She would have to wait until she saw Morrigan use the skill or figure out a way to bring it up in a conversation without raising her suspicions.

She ended up walking with Leliana for a time instead, and she was soon swept up in the young bard's friendly chatter. The other woman was full of curiosity and stories. Leliana asked about her life in the Circle, and Bethana asked about her homeland. She'd seen plenty of Orlais, of course, but she had never truly seen it through the eyes of one who loved it. The Inquisitor's spy-master had only allowed glimpses of her delight to show. The younger Leliana let it pour from her every word. There was melancholy there too- homesickness and something more- but Bethana couldn't ask for her secrets when she wasn't ready to give up her own. She asked for stories instead, and let the bard entertain her with tales of ridiculous fashions and the dramas of Orlesian nobility until they reached their campsite and the sun began to set.


	18. Ferelden - Haven

Ferelden:

A Different Sort of Haven

* * *

The hair at the back of her neck prickled the moment she stepped past the stone fence that marked the beginning of the village, and the sense of unease refused to leave her. Haven felt strange, wrong. It wasn't so much that the buildings were different, or that the village was smaller and more spread out, but that a sense of danger and gloom hung in the air far thicker than the hazy fog. The place was too quiet. It was dark out, but the sun had only been down about an hour.

"Where is everyone?" Bethana murmured.

"Perhaps they all believe in 'early to bed, early to rise'?" Zevran suggested. He sounded completely at ease, but she hadn't missed the way he kept his weight on his toes as he walked, ready to bound into action.

Wynne's responding hum sounded rather doubtful.

"Look! There's someone," Leliana piped up. She pointed to a man in a guard uniform who was walking toward them. Her relief faded somewhat when they saw that his expression was anything but welcoming.

"Well hello-" Alistair started in his usual friendly tones, only to be interrupted.

"What are you doing in Haven?" the guard demanded gruffly. "There is nothing for you here."

Elissa raised her brow and her spine stiffened a little, but her voice remained calm and mild. She looked every inch the noble despite her well-used armor and her somewhat eclectic collection of companions. It was never difficult for Bethana to imagine her as queen.

As Elissa tried to politely pry answers about Haven and Genitivi out of the guard, the future Inquisitor remained silent. It felt **strange** to not be the one in charge, to carry neither the responsibility nor the final say. Bethana couldn't quite decide whether her change in position was more of a relief or a frustration. She had never sought power, and being responsible for the lives of others- let alone the fate of Thedas- was a heavy weight to bear, but she had gotten used to it. Now she followed orders instead of giving them, and the eyes of her companions and those they met fell on Elissa first and foremost.

All the warden was able to get out of the guard was thinly veiled hostility, denials about Genitivi and the Urn, and the location of a trading post.

"Such a warm and friendly place," Zevran said when they entered the shop and received a similarly inhospitable 'welcome' from the trader there.

Bethana hummed an agreement.

They had left the others behind at camp after a brief argument over the fact that they were wasting their time looking for the Ashes. Sten and Morrigan, especially, had thought their quest was idiocy; Shale just hadn't been interested. Zevran was rather irreverent about the whole thing as well, but he said he'd sworn an oath to follow the lovely Warden and he was standing by it.

Bethana was of the opinion that he simply chose the group with the most potential for flirting.

Growing bored- or perhaps just curious- as the wardens traded with the shopkeeper and tried unsuccessfully to pry information out of him, Zevran started snooping around the room. The shopkeeper glanced his way nervously, though as far as Bethana could tell Zevran pilfered nothing. Then he wandered towards the open doorway to their left and the nervousness turned to indignant alarm.

"What are you doing? You can't go back there! That's private!" the shopkeeper said. He shoved past the wardens to get in Zevran's way. "I've had enough of you. Get out!"

"Awfully defensive, aren't you?" Bethana asked, stepping up beside Zevran. She could understand not wanting strangers walking freely around one's house, but that was quite an overreaction.

"What are you hiding?" Elissa's eyes narrowed as well, and after a moment's consideration she slipped behind the shopkeeper and into the other room.

"No!" the man shouted. He drew a worn sword clumsily from its sheath and lunged at Elissa's turned back.

He never reached her. Bethana called up an ice spell that trapped his feet, but she needn't have bothered. One of Zevran's daggers was already lodged between his ribs.

"That was a mistake," the assassin stated, his eyes cold though his words were as blithe as ever. The shopkeeper fell to the floor, gasping uselessly for air. Blood bubbled at the corners of his mouth; he quickly grew still.

"Zevran!" Leliana yelped in protest.

"You would rather I let him stab her in the back?"

"I wouldn't feel too badly for him," Elissa said grimly. They gave the body one last look them then went to her. In the furthest corner of the room lay the body of a knight in Redcliffe armor. There was blood all over the floor, and he was splayed awkwardly across several partial skeletons.

"Oh no," Leliana murmured. "Genitivi... Do you think...?"

"If they do this to everyone who comes around asking questions, he probably didn't last long," said Elissa.

"Do I need to point out that we've been asking a lot of questions as well?" Bethana asked.

"I do believe I hear the sounds of a gathering crowd," Zevran said, tilting his head towards the window. "I'm sure they intend to welcome us warmly. Perhaps we shouldn't keep them waiting."

"Surely we don't intend to slaughter the townspeople." Leliana didn't look happy with the idea, but Bethana couldn't help noticing that she'd already drawn her bow. Leliana had always been a unique blend of pragmatism and idealism: she could be logical and strategic to the point of being cold, but when she believed something, she believed **hard**. Somehow, though, she seemed to have lost a lot of her optimism and compassion along the way. It had made her an incredible spy-master, but Bethana felt a little sad every time she took note of the change; Leliana seemed happier in her youth.

"If they try to kill us, what choice do we have?" Bethana asked, displeased with the situation as well.

"We don't know that it will come to that," said Wynne.

"We need to be ready all the same," Elissa said. She waited just long enough to make sure everyone was armed before stalking grimly towards the door.

Any hopes of diplomacy went out the window as soon as they stepped outside. Most of the townspeople who had gathered were covered in armor, and they had mages with them. Bethana threw up a quick set of shields to counter the Haven mages' hex. The armored men attacked; they were in the middle of battle before Leliana could say more than a pleading, "Wait!"

The Haven men fought like zealots, with no mercy and little regard for their own safety.

"Watch it!" Alistair warned just before blood magic splattered against Bethana's shields and they all cracked. The backlash caused an odd sort of ache in her head, but she ignored it with the ease of long practice.

Alistair used his shield to knock his opponent back long enough to center himself and cast a holy smite upon the nearest blood mage. Even though she was out of range of the attack, the templar ability sent cold tingles across the surface of Bethana's skin. At one point it would have made her uneasy, but she had fought side by side with templars for so long that it had quite the opposite effect.

The moment the blood mage stumbled beneath the smite, one of Leliana's arrows lodged in his throat. The other Haven mage met a similar fate at Zevran's hands moments later. With them out of the way and Wynne to focus on keeping their comrades healed, Bethana dropped the shields and focused on offensive magic.

The air around them cooled as she sent one ice spell after another to slow their enemies and trap their feet. She heard the scrap of shifting armor as one of the Haven soldiers swung a sword at her back. Bethana turned just in time to freeze him. The spell was still hissing in the air as Alistair slammed into the stranger and the frozen body shattered with the impact.

Outnumbered though they were, Bethana and her companions were far better trained and better equipped than the Haven fighters. It wasn't long until their enemies all lay dead at their feet.

"We need to keep moving," Elissa said. She eyed the huts around them warily, but it seemed that at least some of the village had enough sense to stay inside and leave them alone. "We need to find out what's going on here."

"Do you think they're trying to protect the ashes?" asked Bethana quietly as they all followed the Warden towards the wide path at the other end of the village.

"With violence and blood magic?" Zevran asked, effectively cutting off the guilt that was threatening to stir in her. He was right, of course. Good intentions hardly excused the fact that they seemed to slaughter anyone who asked too many questions. The elf shrugged. "Perhaps."

The path was clear where it cut between two hills, but where it opened up into another clearing, there were more houses. A group of villagers waited there, and the Warden's group slowed. The villagers wore no armor and they carried no weapons, but their angry, determined expressions left little doubt as to their intentions.

"We don't have to do this," Elissa said loudly as they approached. "We didn't come here to fight you."

Their expressions didn't change. They simply stared. As they got closer Bethana could see that while their faces were twisted by aggression, their eyes were almost blank. Empty. She shuddered, and at that moment the villagers attacked.

It had been one thing to fight the soldiers and blood mages, but the villagers... Bethana expected a slaughter with killing made far too easy by their enemies' unarmed state. It felt wrong. She hesitated, and instead of bringing a harmful spell to her fingertips when one of the village women ran at her, she called up a spell to petrify. The earth bucked beneath the villager's feet then rose up to wrap around her, holding her in place. Or rather that was what it was meant to do. With a strength that should have been impossible, the woman ripped herself free of the trap with a yell. Stunned and off guard, Bethana barely remembered to duck as the woman swung at her. The small, bare fist clipped her temple with far more power than was natural. Bethana's vision went gray for a moment. In self defense, her magic lashed out, and she heard a shriek as the villager was blasted away from her.

"Beth!" Elissa called out in alarm.

"I'm fine!" she said. It was mostly true. Her vision cleared in time for her to send a thick shard of ice through the heart of the next villager to attack her. She didn't hesitate again, instead doing her best to put down the men and women with unnatural strength before they could hurt her friends. By the time it was all over, her magic was sweeping away the last of her headache.

"Alright?" Alistair asked as he walked over, his eyes full of concern.

"Yes," Bethana said. She grimaced ruefully as she rubbed at the side of her head. "My fault. I underestimated them."

"Yeah, that was **not** normal," Alistair said.

"We need to keep moving," Elissa reminded them. Alistair gave the bodies scattered around them a troubled frown then followed obediently along with Bethana as the other warden started back up the path.

They were forced to dispatch a few more villagers in their way, but the group soon found themselves at the top of the hill. A Chantry building stood alone at the end of the path. A golden, peach-colored glow shown through the stained glass in the windows, and two torches were lit on either side of the door. It looked warm and welcoming. The low murmur of voices filtered out from beneath the door.

"Sounds like the whole rest of the village might be in there," Alistair said.

"Well, we can't leave without saying hello," said Elissa. Her mouth curved in a grim smile, then she lead them inside.


	19. Ferelden - Faith

Ferelden:

Faith

* * *

Faith was a powerful thing. It had gotten Bethana through the years of the mage-templar war and the years of the Inquisition. She had faith in the Maker and faith in her companions, and that faith had made all the difference. She had seen up close how strong and resilient faith could make people.

She forgot, on occasion, how dangerous it could make them as well.

"...We are blessed beyond measure. We are chosen by the Holy and Beloved to be her guardians," an older man wearing robes was saying as they followed the wardens into the building. The townspeople were clustered around him, listening with avid expressions. They looked none too pleased when the wardens walked through their ranks. Bethana and Wynne stayed back near the door where they had a better range of fire for their spells.

"Welcome," the 'Revered Father' said in tones that might have been mild if it hadn't been for the hint of smugness. "I heard we had a group of visitors wandering about the village. I trust you've enjoyed your time in Haven so far."

"I wouldn't call finding the bodies of the knights sent ahead of us 'fun'," Elissa said coldly.

"Strangers cannot understand our ways. We don't owe you any explanations for our actions," the grey haired man said. Low murmurs of agreement rose from the gathered townspeople. Bethana's grip tightened on her staff.

"How many people have you killed for no other reason than that they were strangers?" she asked.

Not a single glimmer of regret or sorrow sparked on any of their faces. "We have a sacred duty," said the Revered Father. "Failure to protect Her would be a greater sin. All will be forgiven." Then he reached for his own staff, flung a hex at the wardens, and the room plunged into chaos.

Wynne drew a protection glyph around the pair before the enemy's spell could take hold. Bethana froze the feet of the townsmen nearest Zevran; they stumbled long enough for the quick strikes of his daggers to part the vulnerable skin at their throats. Then she threw a handful of flame at the face of the first one to come at her.

Early in the fight Bethana saw some of the townspeople flee; though it might have been foolish, she did nothing to hinder them. They might have been going to reinforcements, but she hoped with all her might that they would go back to their families and focus on keeping them safe. She didn't want to wipe out any more of the village than absolutely necessary for their own survival.

Outnumbered though they were, Bethana and her companions put their enemies down in short order until only the 'Revered Father' remained. The old man gave a yell of shear fury and swung his staff at the wardens. Alistair and Elissa dove in different directions, but the wave of blood magic was tenacious. It tangled around Elissa's ankles, and she cried out as it sank beneath her skin and black splotches of bruises spread rapidly up her legs, racing towards her heart.

Alistair shoved a desperate smite towards the blood mage, barely distracting him long enough for Leliana to shoot an arrow through his eye. The 'Revered Father' dropped like a stone and his magic died out. Elissa was left panting on the floor as the others rushed to her in near panic.

"It's all right," Wynne said after sending a wave of healing magic through Elissa. Her voice turned stern when Alistair continued to hover anxiously. "We stopped him in time. She's just fine."

The rest of them breathed sighs of relief and turned to study the mess they'd made while Alistair insisted on helping Elissa up.

"Look around," Elissa said. "See if any of these notes or books mention the Sacred Ashes." She sighed and pushed back the strands of hair that had come loose around her face. "I really don't want to have to go back to the village to find answers."

"Probably should have left one alive to question, hm?" Zevran mused, nudging a limp body with one foot. His gaze shifted to his companions and he shook his head. "We won, cara mia," he said to a sorrowful Leliana as she stared at the bodies scattered across the floor. "Shouldn't you be a little more pleased to have survived?"

"It's just... **sad** , don't you think? They were fighting for something they believed in... Faith shouldn't end like this," Leliana sighed. She shook her head and turned away to help search the chantry.

Zevran snorted in quiet derision. "No? Because it seems to me that this is exactly how faith ends. Or do you not believe the part about Andraste being burned alive?"

"I... I suppose you have a point," the archer agreed with a troubled frown. "I hadn't really thought of it that way."

He smirked at her. "Having second thoughts?"

"It's not so different from risking our lives trying to stop the Blight," Bethana mused aloud. "I think part of faith is accepting that we're part of something bigger than ourselves. I happened to believe that the Maker has a plan, and I intend to play my part." She shrugged with a crooked little smile. "I'd rather die with faith than live without it."

Leliana looked thoughtful, thought Zevran only shook his head. The former Crow started searching through the pockets of the dead while the others turned towards the tables and bookshelves. Elissa and Alistair went to search the other room and Bethana smiled a little to herself as the hope passed through her mind that the wardens would take advantage of a moment alone together.

Her smile faded as she looked over one of the scrolls that had been left on the tables. It was written in the style of the Chant of Light, full of big words and poetic verse and frequent mentions of Andraste, but the pretty words couldn't hide the fact that the contents were disturbing.

"Guys? I think these people have been drinking dragon blood," she said.

"That can't be good for you," Zevran muttered.

Leliana grimaced. "Do you think that explains their unusual strength?" she asked.

"And their somewhat questionable sanity." That blank look in their eyes, even amidst their anger- Bethana had known something was wrong, but ... ick.

"So, what- they've been raising dragons like sheep?" Zevran wondered. "Where are they keeping them?"

"I'm not sure that's it. The scrolls call the blood and power a gift from 'Her'. I thought they were talking about Andraste at first, but this one makes it sound like it's a reward for caring for 'Her' children, and somehow I don't think it's talking about the human race."

"Ah-ha!" Zevran's triumphant exclamation interrupted her perusal. There was a quiet click of something falling into place and the scraping of stone against stone. Elissa and Alistair returned from the other room in time to see a portion of one wall shift to one side.

"Well done," Elissa murmured; her expression lit up hopefully at the sight of more bookshelves. Perhaps they had information about the Sacred Ashes after all.

As soon as the entered the other room, however, a low groan tore their attention from the books. A balding man in the robes of a scholar lay on an old rug, battered and bruised.

"Genitivi?" Leliana exclaimed as she rushed to his side, hope and horror and compassion at war in her expression.

"Who-?" the older man groaned. He flinched when Leliana touched his shoulder though her hands were gentle. "Here to finish me off?"

"No," Elissa said, her voice firm but kind. "Lady Isolde sent us to search for you in hopes that you could lead us to the Sacred Ashes. When we reached Haven... Well, we were beginning to fear the worst for you."

"Oh," Genetivi sighed. His relief was potent enough to sweep away the pain in his expression, at least for the moment. Then something almost manic took it's place and his hand darted out to grab Leliana's arm with surprising strength. "The Ashes- They're here."


	20. Ferelden - The Temple of Sacred Ashes

Ferelden:

The Temple of the Sacred Ashes

* * *

No amount of arguing could convince Genetivi that it was unwise to head straight up the mountain path that he was convinced would lead them to the Sacred Ashes, despite his injuries. To be fair, it would not have been safe to leave him alone in the Haven chantry, nor could he travel back to Denerim or Redcliffe, but the trip up the mountain was nearly his undoing. Though short, the hike was cold: wind howled in Bethana's eyes and snow stung her skin, and while she was neither lost nor alone, she was strongly reminded of the night Haven feel and she had nearly frozen to death trying to find the survivors. She stuck close enough to the wardens and their friends that she trod on more than one heel. If anyone found that odd, they said nothing.

Thankfully, Genetivi was content to remain near the entrance taking notes and making sketches of the carvings once they had got into the actual temple. The journey through the outer temple was bloody and frustrating. There were cultists around every corner it seemed: none of them willing to talk or surrender. The corridors were a maze of traps, collapsed ceilings and blocked passages where too much ice and snow had crept in through gaps in the crumbling stonework. They were forced to wander back and forth, looking for a way through while their enemies hounded their steps.

Then there were the caves beneath the temple, full of dragon hatchlings and drakes as well as their armed caretakers. By the time the wardens' group met Kolgrim, the leader of the cultists, they were more than weary. So when the cultists' offered them a deal- safe passage in exchange for tainting the urn of ashes- Elissa took it. Kolgrim led them out of the caves and across the trail that would at long last take them to their goal- a goal that was guarded by a dark purple dragon.

Bethana had seen more than her share of high dragons in her life, but the sight of one never ceased to send a potent surge of fear and awe through her veins. The cultists were wrong to worship such a creature, but she could understand- just a little- why it's presence made them bow their heads.

"Maker's breath," Alistair gasped as the Haven dragon landed in front of them. The ground shook, and the creature spread her massive wings wide enough to block out the sun as she blasted a column of fire over their heads. The snow at their feet began to melt. She took up the entirety of the path before them, and with a group of well-armed cultists at their back, they were effectively trapped.

And still Bethana could not help but think that the beast was beautiful.

"Great Andraste!" Kolgrim threw himself forward onto his knees with his arms raised in supplication and begged the dragon to let them pass. The more devout among the wardens' companions winced at the blasphemy. "I pray you: stay your wrath! I bring before you your champion, who will fall upon your enemies as a cleansing flame, paving the way for your glory!"

Bethana watched every move the dragon made, and not just because she was watching for signs that it was about to attack. She wanted to solidify the image in her memories; she couldn't help but imagine what it might feel like to tower over other creatures with leathery wings tucked against her scaled sides, her tail lashing behind her like a cat contemplating pouncing. Bethana knew that it was possible, after all, to learn to take that form. She didn't know whether she would ever have the power or knowledge or skill to attempt it, but the desire to learn remained.

The dragon tilted her head to study them with one cold, yellow eye. Bethana couldn't tell whether she understood anything of the man's words, or if the dragon was simply responding to the submissive posture of one of the humans who played nursemaid for her hatchlings, but the dragon didn't attack. She snorted once- hot, sulfureous breath that turned the air around them humid and unpleasant- then the dragon spread her wings and took flight, leaving the path to the inner temple open.

"You see now her greatness, her benevolence?" the cult leader asked, gloating as he got to his feet. "Despite the destruction you've caused, all will be forgiven when you keep your word." He took Elissa's hand- ignoring the way the entire group tensed in outrage when he touched her- and pressed a small glass vial into her grasp. "Just a few drops is all it will take and our dear Andraste will be free of the ties that bind her to her former life."

Elissa nodded stiffly. Aside from a muffled sound of distress from Leliana, none of the rest of them argued. Kolgrim waved them onward and the wardens' group walked the rest of the way in silence. They reached the inner temple and entered without any problems, but only when they shut the door behind them, closing out the malevolent gazes of the dragon and her cultists, did they finally relax.

"Well, that could have been a lot worse," Bethana said. She put her staff back into its sheath on her back for the first time in what felt like hours and massaged her hands, aching from tension held too long. "Leaving probably isn't going to be fun, but at least we'll get a chance to catch our breaths this way."

"You think they'll try to kill us when we've completed our task?" Zevran asked.

"They're likely to notice when we try to leave **without** completing our task," Elissa corrected. The mild words eased the last knot of tension between Bethana's shoulders; she'd been right about the future queen's plans.

"You're not going to try to taint the Ashes," Leliana said, her eyes lit with joy and relief.

"Of course not," Elissa said.

"You lied to them," Alistair said, sounding surprised enough to draw glances of bemusement from some of his companions. He flushed, a little embarrassed, but Bethana thought she understood. From what she'd seen, Alistair was a very straight forward sort of person who valued loyalty and honor and honesty, and who tended to see things in black and white. It very well might not have even occurred to him to lie outright to get out of a difficult situation.

Elissa was clearly different.

"We were tired and outnumbered, and I don't feel any guilt at all for lying to someone intent on either using or killing us," she explained. There was no mocking or offense behind her words; there wasn't any apology either.

"Clever," Zevran said. "Though our exit would likely be easier if we actually did as agreed."

"Don't be absurd," Wynne scolded, echoed by a scandalized Leliana. Zevran only shrugged, seemingly content at having attempted to be the voice of reason. He turned to flirting to smooth things over.

By that point Bethana had stopped listening.

There was a quiet sense of... something she couldn't put words to down the dark stone hallway: a sort of glow that Bethana could feel but not see. It wasn't a warm glow like fire or life. It felt clean, like the aftermath of a well-focused cleanse. It felt otherworldly and familiar all at once, and though she couldn't have said exactly why, it brought to mind the spirit of Faith that Wynne carried within herself.

Bethana was halfway down the hall before she remembered her companions and looked back.

"Bethana?" Alistair asked, his brow furrowed.

She must have looked strange wandering off into the dark as though in a trance. She conjured a small magelight into her palm with a twitch of her fingers.

"Can you feel that?" she asked. She turned her violet eyes back down the hall. "I think... I think someone's waiting for us."

"Some **one** or some **thing**?" Zevran clarified.

"Kolgrim did say that the Ashes are guarded," said Leliana.

Bethana was already walking again, only half aware of the conversation behind her. She jumped when a hand touched her arm and glanced over to find Elissa watching her intently.

"Are you all right?" the warden asked. There was concern there, but there was wariness and suspicion too, and Bethana was reminded again that she was with people who had little reason to trust her instincts.

"I'm all right. Honestly. I'm not under a spell or anything- at least I don't think so," Bethana said. "I don't know how to explain. I just feel like we need to go this way. You really don't feel **anything** calling to you?"

Elissa hesitated a moment before shaking her head negatively.

"Perhaps the mountain air is getting to you, yes?" Zevran suggested.

"I am not sure what I feel," Leliana said, willing to at least be open to the idea. "My heart is so full. Just being here is..." she trailed off, searching for a word to encompass the experience. Her hands were clasped together over her heart; an earnest expression brightened her face. "Extraordinary."

"Whatever the case, perhaps we had better keep moving," Wynne said, practical though her words were hushed in respect for where they were.

With a murmur of agreement, they started walking again. This time Bethana fought the gentle tug of her heart enough to remain aware of her surroundings. They hadn't gone far before the darkness around them lightened and soon her magelight was no longer needed at all. Flickering torchlight spilled out of a room around the corner at the end of the hall.

They stepped into the room cautiously, the rouges looking for signs of traps, but there seemed to be nothing there except for the torches and a door set into the far wall.

"What are the chances that there's something horrible on the other side of that door?" Alistair asked. He eyed the exit with a resigned sort of wariness, used to things going wrong.

"We're in the Inner Temple of the Sacred Ashes," Leliana protested. "There won't be anything horrible here."

"The rest of the Temple was crawling with dragons and cultists," Alistair pointed out. "And they did say there was something guarding the Ashes."

"I believe they were speaking of me," a deep voice spoke, startling all of them. They reached for their weapons as a pale, translucent figure appeared in front of the door. An **armed** figure; he was outfitted like a soldier and growing more solid by the second. The glow around him faded until he looked like an ordinary man.

Elissa was the first to loosen her grip on her sword and step forward. "Are you the one protecting this place from the people out there?" she asked.

He gave a solemn nod. "I am the Guardian of the Ashes."

"Then they are here," Alistair breathed in relief.

"Indeed," the Guardian said. "I am here to guide the faithful who come seeking Her."

The others had questions about who he was and how the villagers outside had come to worship a dragon, as well as questions about Andraste herself. The Guardian answered every one with unwavering patience, though there was little he could put into words about his experience with Andraste. In time their questions ran out, and they sought to move on.

"We must get to the Ashes," Elissa said after briefly explaining their purpose for coming. It did not, perhaps, cast them in the most devoted light, coming for a cure rather than seeking to know more about Andraste, but the Guardian was unperturbed.

"You must pass the Gauntlet," the Guardian said. "If you are found worthy, you will see the Urn and be allowed to take a small pinch of the Ashes for yourself. If not..." He trailed off ominously.

"I don't suppose the fact that we had to fight the entire way here counts?" Zevran sighed.

Elissa pursed her lips but didn't object. "Very well," she said.

"Before you go, there is something I must ask." The Guardian spoke to Elissa, his gaze focused on her alone. At her shoulder, Alistair shifted uneasily. "There is suffering in your past- your suffering and the suffering of others. You abandoned your father and mother, leaving them in the hands of Rendon Howe, knowing he would show no mercy."

A soft, strangled sound of pain and rage escaped Elissa's throat, and she lurched forward, her hands dropping to her daggers. Alistair grabbed her before she could attack the Guardian, clearly more worried about how the mystical being might retaliate than whether she might hurt him. The Guardian seemed neither surprised nor offended however.

"You've **no** right-!" Alistair snapped.

"That's not true!" Elissa spat. "I didn't **abandon** them. I had no choice! My father- My father made me promise."

Bethana had never seen her so discomposed; the warden's obvious anguish made her feel sick with empathy. She'd never known how the queen of Ferelden lost her parents that way.

The Guardian was less sympathetic. "Do you think you failed your parents?" he asked.

Elissa's expression crumpled. "I promised to survive. To live. I-" She sagged in Alistair's embrace for one brief moment, then she took a deep, shaking breath and straightened to stand on her own. The hurt and anger remained, but the fierce, stubborn pride that so defined her was seeping back into her eyes.

"No," she said. "There was a time when I wished that I had stayed with them, died with them, but I kept my word, and I don't regret surviving any longer. I **grieve** for them. I always will. But I have too much to do, too much to live for to believe that my place is in a grave by their sides."

"Thank you," the Guardian said, something gentling in his tone. "That is what I needed to know." Then, to their dismay, he turned his attention to the rest of them. "And what of your companions? Alistair, knight and warden: you wonder if things might have been different if you were with Duncan on the battlefield. You could have shielded him from the killing blow."

It wasn't an accusation- the Guardian was simply putting inner uncertainties into words- but Alistair flinched as though it was. It was Elissa's turn to turn defensive.

"The whole army was overrun! If Alistair **or** I had been down there, the only thing that would have changed was that we'd be dead **with** them," she said.

"Ah, but you wonder, don't you- if you should have died, and not him," the Guardian said to Alistair, ignoring the other warden's outburst. "Do you believe that someone else should have survived in your place?"

He flinched, then flushed and looked down. "I- Yes," Alistair admitted, the word quiet and choked with shame. "I don't- It's not that I want to die, but Duncan would have been so much better at this, more useful. It should have been him."

The Guardian murmured his thanks again, accepting the reply without judgement, but Elissa couldn't just let that go.

"No," she said suddenly, low and fierce. "He wouldn't have been."

Alistair finally looked up, completely bewildered- as though part have him had suspected her of wishing he was someone else all along.

"But... Duncan-"

"He might have been a good man, but he wasn't who I needed, Alistair," Elissa said. Her cheeks were a little pink, though whether that was from embarrassment or pure anger was anyone's guess. She resolutely ignored the fact that they had an audience. "We wouldn't have had anyone capable of draining the magic from blood mages and darkspawn emissaries; you know you've saved our lives in battle more than once. He certainly wouldn't have followed my lead; I wouldn't have followed his orders without question either, and in all likelihood we would have spent our time arguing instead of getting things done. You value my opinions and I value yours. I wouldn't have trusted him to watch my back, not the way I trust you. You- your support, your faith in me, your humor and friendship- you make me stronger. I couldn't do this without you."

There was a long moment of silence as Alistair struggled to absorb that, his every emotion written clearly across his face.

"Is this the part where there's kissing?" Zevran asked, promptly shattering the mood.

"Zevran," Leliana hissed, scolding, as both wardens tore their gazes from each other and looked anywhere else.

As though he'd never been interrupted, the Guardian turned his attention to the last to speak, Leliana. "And you- why do you say the Maker speaks to you, when all know that the Maker has left? He spoke only to Andraste. Do you believe herself your equal?"

The former chantry sister looked startled and flustered. "I never said that. I-"

"In Orlais, you were someone," the Guardian continued. "In Lothering, you feared you would lose yourself, become a drab sister and disappear. When your brothers and sisters of the cloister criticized you for what you professed, you were hurt, but you also reveled in it. It made you special. You enjoyed the attention, even if it was negative."

"You're saying that I made it up for- for the attention? I did not. I know what I believe!" Leliana protested. She held firm beneath the Guardian's searching gaze, and after a moment he nodded and moved on.

Bethana squeezed Leliana's shoulder in a gesture of approval and support, and in doing so, drew the Guardian's attention to herself.

"Herald," he said. It didn't sound like an accusation, but it **felt** like one. Her heart fluttered anxiously in her chest; that one word held so many of her secrets, her hopes and fears and insecurities. To have them laid bare in front of people she respected but barely knew was uncomfortable to the point of being painful. "Or so you would be called. But you know the truth of what they saw. You are a mortal woman, stumbling through circumstances not of your making or under your control. Who are you to seek such adulation and power? Who are you to dare pretend that you are chosen? Charlatan? Fraud?"

 _He's right,_ she thought. I was nothing she hadn't asked herself before. And yet... it wasn't shame or embarrassment that rose to the surface as she searched her heart for the answer, but calm, quiet certainty.

"I'm just me," Bethana answered. "I never sought adulation, and the power I sought was not for myself. And maybe I'm not the 'Herald' in the way they meant the title, but I do believe I am chosen for something. I believe we all are."

The Guardian studied her a minute longer. It felt as though he could see into her soul, but she found that despite her audacity and the fact that she knew he would see her flaws, she was not afraid of what he would find there. When he finally broke his gaze, the Guardian gave her a deep, respectful nod.

Then he turned his attention to Wynne, and Bethana was left to sort through the jumble of emotions the encounter had stirred up. He had managed in a few sentences to uncover uncertainties that she had been trying to bury since the day she fell out of the rift. She felt raw and exposed, but there was a giddy sort of relief at having found an answer.

The Guardian questioned Wynne's belief in her own words and truths, but the healer answered him calmly, unshaken. Bethana couldn't help but think that despite- or ever because of- the fact that she admitted to having doubts at times, Faith suited Wynne. Wisdom might have too; the healer seemed to be well grounded in both.

"And the Antivan elf," the Guardian said, turning lastly to Zevran.

"Oh, is it my turn now? Hurrah, I am so excited." For once Zevran's sarcasm didn't entirely hide the uneasiness underneath.

"Many have died by your hand, but are there any you regret more than a woman by the name of-"

"How do you know about that?" Zevran demanded, interrupting before the name could be spoken. When pressed for an answer, his expression grew harder and colder. The glibness was gone. "Yes," he snapped. "The answer is yes, I regret, if that is what you **must** know. Now move on."

"You may pass," the Guardian intoned solemnly. He didn't let them bask in their sense of relief very long. "Though this is not your last test. Only the faithful may reach the Urn. Once there, you may take only what you must."

 _One pinch to save Arl Eamon,_ Bethana thought. But if Andraste's ashes could truly spark a miracle... The memory of Cullen turned to stone, cold and lifeless, flashed through her thoughts. _Greedy,_ her mind cautioned uncomfortably. _Verging on sacrilegious? Miracles aren't meant to be toted around in everyday pockets like a simple pouch of elfroot. But..._ She thought of Cullen again, and knew she had to ask. It wasn't disrespect for Andraste that prompted her desire, after all, but love- and the fear of losing it.

She looked up to find that the Guardian was watching her. If he could read her heart well enough to pull her insecurities out into the light, perhaps he already knew what she wanted and why.

"What if we need some for somebody else?" she asked, quiet and respectful and as far from demanding as she could be. She tried not to fidget as the others gave her startled looks and the Guardian took his time giving her an answer.

At long last, he held out his hand. Two tiny, empty vials rested on his palm. Bethana let out a relieved breath and gingerly reached for one. Elissa took the second.

"Thank you," Bethana said.

"These two **only** ," the Guardian cautioned. "And know that when you leave this temple, I will take the Ashes elsewhere. Their time in this place is done. Maker be with you." Then he disappeared without another word.

With a glance at the rest of them, Elissa opened the door and lead them through.


	21. Ferelden - Ghosts of the Past

Ferelden:

Ghosts of the Past

* * *

A series of riddle-speaking ghosts waited for them in the next room. Between the six of them, they answered the riddles with relative ease, learning a little more about Andraste with every spirit.

There were two doorways to the next room, both of them blocked by a thin magical shield. It didn't take long for them to figure out that only Elissa and Bethana could pass through. After a few efforts from their comrades to break through the shields, the pair of them exchanged glances.

"Perhaps this trial is ours alone because we're the ones carrying the vials," Bethana suggested.

"We could switch," Alastair said. He grimaced when his fellow warden shook her head.

"We'll be all right. The trials are meant to test us, not hurt us," Elissa said. She offered him a reassuring smile, confident and calm. Then she walked into one room, and Bethana walked into the other.

A single figure waited for her there- a ghost or a memory given shape, she would never be sure. He was older than the last time she'd seen him; the faint lines that gave testament to his often furrowed brow and the weight that he had carried were more familiar to her than her own face. The sight flooded her with longing and loss so potent that she could barely breathe.

"Hello, Beth," he said quietly- **warmly** , with all of the sweet adoration that had been missing in his younger self. Seeing love in his eyes again broke her heart.

"Cullen," she whispered. Her vision blurred, and she blinked rapidly, trying to clear her tears. "Cullen. You- You're my trial? Is this- are you really-?"

She made her way to him on trembling legs and lifted a hand to touch his cheek. She hesitated, then he brought his fingers to her wrist and instead of resting on her skin, they passed through. He gave her a look of compassion when she flinched at the absence of his touch.

"You know I can't be here, not really. Not alive and unchanged. You can't go back to the way things were nor to who I was."

There was a hint of the Commander in the words, but his tone and his expression were infinitely gentle. He knew exactly how hard it was to be the one who survived. "You have to keep moving forward."

"I don't want to," she admitted, choking back a sob. "I **miss** you. I don't want to do this without you. I- I'm sorry- for failing, for leaving, for changing everything we were together."

"Beth, no. Don't say that," he pleaded. "You didn't fail. You gave us another chance. You know that."

"Did I?"

Cullen's gaze searched her own. He didn't need whatever powers the Guardian had to see into her soul; he knew her too well. "What are you so afraid of?"

She didn't even try to deny it. "What if I change too much? What if I make things worse? What if- what if you don't fall in love with me this time?"

"Oh, Beth," he breathed. "How could I ever not love you?"

There was so much certainty in his eyes. It made her fall silent, staring; it filled her heart, and finally, **finally** , her grief began to ease a fraction at a time.

"Do you love him- that broken wreck of a man you met in the tower?"

She frowned immediately at the disparaging tone when he described himself. "Of course I do."

Cullen smiled. "Then give me time. I'll come around. Trust in me. Trust in us." He touched her face, his ghostly fingers skimming over the surface of her cheek. She couldn't feel it, but the memories were so vivid that she could almost imagine she did. She trembled. "Don't hold so tight to this version of me that you can't see what's in front of you or what's ahead. I need to know that you're going to **live**." He brushed an intangible kiss against her forehead. "But you're not alone. You'll never really be alone."

She stood silent for a long, long moment, soaking in the love that shone from her husband's eyes. The memory was going to have to last her for a long time. Then she took a slow, deep breath and forced herself to nod. "I'll try."

"You'll be all right." He said it like a promise, like he knew. "You're the strongest person I know." The spirit smiled and began to fade. It was far too soon; Bethana felt as though her heart was tearing itself from her chest in an effort to follow him, but she managed to not beg him to stay.

"I love you," she said instead. Then the ghost of him vanished, and she was left with the echoes of his reply.

 _"And I love you."_

He'd told her on their wedding day that everything had been worth it. It was; it would be. Someday she would tell him, the living version that she'd met in that tower, exactly what they had lost and what they had gained, and she had to believe that on that day, they would both believe it was still worth everything. She had to believe.

She might have stood there for hours if she'd been alone. Bethana didn't even notice that the shields at either end of the room had disappeared until Zevran and Leliana walked into the room.

"Beth! Are you all right?" Leliana asked immediately, darting over to Bethana's side in concern. "What happened?"

Bethana swiped at her tear-streaked cheeks. The reassuring smile she attempted came out as a grimace. "I'm fine. Or I will. I don't really want to talk about it. Suffice it to say, I think my heart's been on display enough for one day."

"Elissa's room opened about the same time as yours did," Zevran said. He looked the slightest bit wary of Bethana's emotional state.

"Then we should probably check on her," she said, walking away quickly. She couldn't handle Leliana's hovering at the moment, no matter how kindly meant it was.

They met up with Elissa and the others in the hallway just past their separate rooms. Elissa looked as though she'd shed a few tears as well, though she looked no less focus and determined than before. She didn't seem to mind how close Alistair was standing in his concern. Elissa met Bethana's gaze, and her lips twitched in a grim mimicry of a smile.

"You look ready to move on," the warden commented. She didn't get any argument from Bethana. Elissa led the way to the next door with brisk steps, answering Leliana's concerned question about her well being with a clipped "Fine".

They were attacked the moment they walked into the next room. Bethana pulled a shield around their group instinctively. The spell solidified just in time to deflect an ill-controlled burst of lightning. She was shocked to see that the mage it came from was a hazy, translucent version of herself. Her shield wavered.

"It's the next test," Wynne cautioned. "You must ignore who they look like."

That was easier said than done when the violent spirits took the appearance of her new friends. It was hard to attack any more than half-heartedly when it was an echo of Leliana that shot arrows at her or a spirit that wore Alistair's face that it struck at her with it's sword. Still, it **was** necessary- the spirits gave them no opportunity to parley- and by focusing on the fact that she had to protect her comrades, the fight was made simpler.

A short time later, the last of their opponents dissolved into mist beneath the 'killing' blow, and the wardens' group was left panting and irritable at what they'd been put through.

"What was that about the trials not being meant to hurt us?" Zevran asked.

Elissa sighed but didn't begrudge him his grumbling as she ushered them through yet another door.

To everyone's immense relief, the next trial required neither fighting nor facing the deepest insecurities and pain within themselves; it was a simple puzzle. Elissa, impressing Bethana with her quickness of mind, solved it easily.

By that point they were expecting another series of tests. It was something of a surprise to find themselves next in the room where the Urn stood in a place of honor atop a tall flight of stairs. A tall statue of Andraste stood over it, flame flickering in its stone hand. They all stopped and stared.

"There it is," Alistair said. "The Urn of Sacred Ashes."

"Unless, of course, it only looks like the Urn. It could be another trap," Zevran pointed out.

But Bethana didn't think that it was. It felt **right** , somehow, being there. The gentle tug of her heart urged her forward. For all that she had seen many halls decorated with more splendor, with velvet and silk and gold, she had never stood in a place that filled her with such awe.

If the way the words of the Chant of Light tumbled fervently- though quietly- from Leliana's lips, she wasn't the only one who felt that way.

"No," Bethana said without taking her gaze from the Urn. "I think that's really it."

"But how do we get to it?" Alistair asked. Strangely enough, it was only then that Bethana noticed the line of fire that separated them from the stairs. A single alter was all that stood on their side of the fire, and Wynne approached it carefully.

"Cast off the trappings of worldly life," she read from the inscription carved into the top of the alter. "Cloak yourself in the goodness of spirit. King and slave, lord and beggar, be born anew in the Maker's sight."

They were all quiet, thinking over the words until Alistair spoke up again.

"What does that mean? Are we supposed to have a certain cloak? Do we need a king and a slave and a lord and a beggar to cross?" he asked unhappily. "Shouldn't they know by now whether we're worthy or not? I hate riddles."

"Maybe it's more simple than that," Elissa said. "The trappings of worldly life... maybe..." She studied the inscriptions thoughtfully a moment more, then she started unbuckling her armor.

"Wh-What are you doing?!" Alistair demanded, flushing a bright red.

She shot him an amused look. "Casting off my trappings. I think we have to disrobe to get through."

Alistair could only gape at her as the first pieces of her armor came off.

"Now this is a trial I can agree with," Zevran said. He didn't hesitate to follow suit.

Bethana was a little less certain. And a little less comfortable. "But what's the point of that?"

"A test of obedience?" Wynne mused. "Or of faith. Walking through a fire unprotected by armor or even clothing takes trust in Andraste and these trials as well as determination to see them through."

Bethana sighed, not entirely pleased that Wynne made perfect sense. It wouldn't have been so bad if Alistair was the only male there- he was too shy and too gentlemanly to stare- but she was certain that Zevran wouldn't hesitate to look his fill.

Yet they needed the Ashes, not just for Eamon, but for something in the future. She was certain of it.

"Fine," Bethana agreed, beginning to strip with the rest of them. "But I'm trying it in my underthings first. It isn't as though they'd protect me from the fire." They would, however, protect her a bit more from wandering eyes.

"Ah, but it is a shame to hide such beauty," Zevran said. "This is a holy place, no? You are safe here. You should not cover yourself when Andraste herself desires you to be free of trappings."

"Do not blaspheme by turning this into something base, Zevran," Wynne warned lowly. It wasn't often that she sounded dangerous rather than just stern, but her tone was enough to quiet the Antivan's protests.

In the end, they all kept the few last scraps of clothing that protected their modesty and stood before the fire. It was a real fire, not fade-fire or illusion; Bethana could feel the heat of it against her skin. Deciding to step through was not easy, no matter how much she wanted the Ashes. But step through she did, her comrades beside her.

She felt the fire lick her skin, but it didn't burn. There was no pain, only warmth and the sensation of something pure and clean washing over her. Then it was over; the fire was gone and they all stood in front of the stairs, fully clothed in their armor.

Zevran sighed in disappointment. "Well, that was fun while it lasted."

The others had eyes only for the Urn. They quietly, reverently made their way up the stairs.

"These are the earthly remains of Andraste, Prophet and Bride of the Maker," Elissa read the inscription at the base of the Urn.

"I never imagined- I- I have no words to express-" Leliana murmured, sounding breathless. Happy.

Bethana thought she understood how she felt. The trials, even the ones that broke her heart, suddenly seemed worth it. Inexplicably, she felt close to tears.

"I didn't think anyone could succeed in finding Andraste's final resting place, but here... here she is," Alistair said in similarly stunned tones.

"I could not have asked for a greater honor than to be here," Wynne added. There was a great peace written across her face and wove through her words. "I will never forget this feeling."

There was a quiet snort from Zevran, but they all ignored him and for once he decided to keep his comments to himself.

"We-" Elissa had to clear her throat, looking a little overcome herself. "We came a long way. We should get what we came for."

Bethana finally shook herself and stepped forward to help Elissa remove the heavy lid from the Urn. They both hesitated a little then; it felt irreverent to just reach in and grab the Ashes.

 _The ashes of Andraste,_ Bethana thought. _Maker, I still can't wrap my head around that. Knowing they were here and seeing them, feeling this- it's so different._ She laid her palm against the smooth side of Urn. Under other circumstances she would have felt silly talking to ashes with such reverence, but as things were, it felt right. The words came easily.

"We give our thanks to Andraste and the Maker for this gift. Know that we do not take it lightly nor do will we forget the honor of being so blessed," she said quietly. She felt no hesitation then when she dipped the tiny vial the Guardian had given her into the Urn and scooped up a pinch of ashes. Elissa murmured an agreement and followed suit, then they carefully replaced the lid on the Urn.

"We did it," Alistair said. "We actually **found** the Sacred Ashes. We can save Arl Eamon."

Elissa nodded slowly before finally tearing her gaze from the Urn. The awe on her face faded, replaced once again by familiar determination. "Let's get back to Redcliffe."


	22. Ferelden - Camp Interlude

Ferelden:

Interlude

* * *

As expected, they had to fight their way past Kolgrim and the cultists to get out of the Temple Fortunately, the dragon itself ignored them entirely, and they managed to escape Haven without any serious injuries, Genitivi in tow. They headed for their camp and the companions who had stayed behind. As they made their way carefully back down the mountain in the dark, the wardens stuck close together at the front of the group, and Wynne stayed close to Genitivi to keep an eye on his recently healed injuries. Zevran was off flirting with Wynne when Leliana sidled up beside Bethana. The latter tensed, expecting questions or concern or both. She wasn't disappointed.

"The things the Guardian said, about your being some sort of herald-" Leliana started cautiously.

"Leliana," Bethana cut her off without anger. "Look...we all have histories, don't we? Things in our pasts that we've kept to ourselves. I'm just not ready to talk about mine." She glanced at her companion. "Are you?"

The former Orlesian bard fidgeted then shook her head sharply, her gaze fixed on the path at her feet. She looked so blasted **young** that Bethana couldn't resist wrapping an arm briefly around her shoulders.

"Maybe in time we'll both feel more able to tell those stories," she offered. "At the moment I'm still trying to process the fact that we actually found the Andraste's resting place. And that Genetivi can walk and write at the same time; he hasn't put that quill down since we entered the Temple."

Leliana giggled quietly. "Well, I think Wynne might try to take it away from him if she has to keep him from stumbling off a cliff one more time because he isn't watching where he's going."

Bethana breathed an inward sigh of relief as Leliana allowed the conversation to shift to lighter subjects. Zevran soon joined them, nudging his way between them and putting an arm around both their waists. They tolerated it as long as his hands didn't wander, though he earned a shove or two when he flirted a little too outrageously.

Overall, it was a merry band that made their way back to camp. Despite their trials and fatigue, they had gotten what they needed, and none of them had taken any serious injuries. They talked and teased as the night passed, as the sun rose and made its way across the sky. They stopped to rest and eat when they had to, but they were eager to get back to the safety of a larger group. It was well into the next day when they finally stumbled into camp. They were all fairly exhausted, but they managed to put together a semi-coherent tale before they all climbed into their tents.

Though her heart was full and her thoughts were busy with all that had happened, Bethana fell asleep quickly. As she sank into her dreams, the Fade formed the inner sanctum of the Temple of Sacred Ashes around her.

Even though she knew she was in the Fade, the awe in her heart had not lessened. For a time Bethana stood alone, just basking, then one by one spirits began to wander into the edges of her dream. She noticed their arrival but felt no alarm. They weren't demons; none showed aggression or even approached her.

"Remarkable." The quiet word tore Beth's attention away from a pair of curious spirits circling the Urn.

"Solas," she said in acknowledgment, not quite a welcoming greeting. "What are you doing here?"

He stood tall and proud with his hands clasped behind his back, grey fur draped over one shoulder of his thick mage robes. His gaze was fixed on the Urn.

"I've been following your progress from the Fade," he said.

That was not something she'd expected him to say. "You've been watching me? You can do that?"

"Well, not _you_ precisely," Solas said. He took a moment to put it into words, glancing at her from the corner of his eye. "The spirits have taken an interest in you. They reenact your days the way they mimic the greatest battles of old. That is what I see: the spirits' echoes of you."

Bethana shifted uncomfortably at the thought. "Surely they do that with everyone helping the Hero of Ferelden. They're all making history."

"At times," Solas allowed. He turned to study her more fully, unsympathetic to her discomfort. "But they seem rather fixated on you. Perhaps because you carry some of the Fade with you still. Or perhaps because you're doing something no one else has ever done successfully before: tearing a hole through time, reliving your days."

"How do you know that noone has ever done it before? It's not exactly something you're spread around," Bethana said.

Solas only hummed and went silent. After a time she allowed curiosity to make her speak.

"You said 'remarkable'. Did you mean the spirits? The Urn?"

Solas shook his head minutely. "Simply this: that I can _feel_ the strength of your awe and your faith in this echo of reality. It is almost tangible. Perhaps it is no wonder that you've drawn so many spirits."

"It's not my faith; it's Elissa's and Alistairs, Lelian's and Wynne's. Maybe even a tiny bit Zevran's. We found the _Ashes of Andraste_ , Solas. That's no small thing."

But perhaps it was to him. He'd lived with people who claimed to be gods. He'd seen the damage that faith twisted to selfish ends could do. He'd defeated those self-proclaimed gods. He lived with the reality that those whom he'd freed still worshiped them.

"Do you believe in the Maker?" Bethana asked when he gave no reply.

He was quiet long enough that she began to think that he wasn't going to give her an answer, but eventually her own silence paid off.

"I don't know," Solas said slowly, carefully. "I'm sure you understand that I am... wary of those proclaimed to be gods. But... this world had to be formed somehow, and after all we've been through it is difficult to believe that all is coincidence and chance. Even the machinations of those with power only explain so much. Still, in all the ages I have lived, I have seen no proof that the Maker the Chantry worships is the true creator, nor that Andraste was anything more than a brave woman and a charismatic leader, and I can say those same things about you."

That felt far too close to blasphemy for Bethana's comfort; it always did when she was compared to Andraste in any way.

"And the Ashes?" she asked, rather than try to explain her grimace. "I know they'll heal Arl Eamon where nothing else could. Genetivi recorded it all the first time around."

"Doubtless they have power, but something could have been added to them when they were placed here. Perhaps faith itself- that of her followers- was enough to imbue them with power," he mused, though he looked thoughtful rather than convinced as his gaze turned back towards the Urn. "On the other hand, I have never seen any proof that the Maker and Andraste are _not_ what the Chantry say. I would prefer to keep an open mind."

She left him to his thoughts for a while. She didn't need to tell him that she believed; he'd said himself that he could feel it. For the moment, she was content with his company despite all that had gone before and all the uncertainties of the future. Time passed in that strange, trackless way that it did in dreams. Spirits came and went and the scene around them shifted from the Urn to the trials that lead them to it, though Bethana used what control she had over her corner of the Fade to keep the spirits from replaying her moments with Cullen. Those were private and precious and _not_ something she wanted to watch with the man who had torn Cullen from her side.

A familiar warmth nudged against Bethana's heart, and she turned to see that Compassion had joined them. Her face lit up.

"Cole!" she greeted without any of the reserve she'd met Solas with. "How did it go? Are you all right? Is he?"

Compassion looked a little startled, though she wasn't sure whether it was the suddenness of her greeting or the face that she was standing peacefully with Solas.

"The boy is safe. Sleeping. The bad man can't hurt him anymore," the spirit said after a moment.

"That's good," Bethana said. She wondered briefly whether that meant Compassion had killed the man, but after what he'd done to the human Cole and to his mother and sister the first time around, perhaps it was necessary. "Have you decided what to do next?"

Compassion frowned, troubled. "He is afraid of the templars and the Circle. He doesn't want to go. I don't want to make him."

"He could hurt someone without meaning to- himself or his mom or his sister."

"Perhaps you could find him a teacher that isn't part of a Circle," Solas interjected. They both turned to look at him. It wasn't a bad idea, but it might be tricky.

"I don't know a lot of apostates in this time," Bethana said. "Do you?" She had too many plans to do a proper job of it herself. Once the Blight was over, she wanted to go look for Corypheus, and she wanted to find Cullen. And yet... Cole was important too. Both Coles were important. If they needed her, then she'd just have to make time for them. "Maybe I could talk to him, try to explain that the Circles aren't all bad. I felt safe in Ostwick. I don't know if I can get away until the Blight's been taken care of but..."

"I can keep him safe until then," Compassion said.

"Do your best to keep him calm," Solas said. "I imagine that will be easier without his brute of a father tormenting him, but if he's been taught to fear his own magic, he'll be more susceptible to uncontrolled emotional outbursts of magic."

Compassion nodded, watching Solas thoughtfully.

"You missed this. Us," the spirit said suddenly.

Solas tensed. His expression immediately became unreadable, but that really only served as proof that Compassion was right.

"I missed this too," Bethana offered quietly. Solas' wary gaze turned to her. "Being comrades. Being friends. We belong on the same side."

"Bethana..." he sighed.

"I know it can't be easy to even consider giving up hopes and plans that you've built and held on to for I don't even know how long," she hurried to say. "But could you just... give us a chance, Solas. Don't we matter enough for you to try?"

His expression grew strained. He said nothing.

"You weren't supposed to be real," Compassion spoke for him. "Thedas was nothing but a bad dream easily dismissed upon awakening, but then you _were_ real and the others were real and waking hurt."

"This isn't a _dream_ , Solas," Bethana said. Then her cheeks flushed as he raised a brow. She gestured at the Fade around them. "Well _this_ is a dream, but you know what I meant. Thedas is real. Varric and Cassandra and Cullen and the others are real. The people we protected together are _real_. The fact that their lives are hard and imperfect doesn't mean that they have less of a right to _live_ them than your people do."

"You of all people have to have learned by now that you can't save everyone," Solas said.

"You of all people ought to know that I have to try," Bethana countered. "That I am _going_ to try."

They'd reached an impasse once again, for Solas was unwilling to promise to change his course, but he was just as unwilling to make them enemies again before it was absolutely necessary. Bethana's dream began to fade before they could reach any sort of conclusion, but she woke with determination in her heart.

"We'll find another way," she told them both before the waking world pulled her away. Her last memory was a glimpse of wistfulness Solas' probably hadn't meant for her to see.

The sun had barely begun to brighten the sky when Bethana opened her eyes and stiffled a groan.

"'s early," she complained to Leliana, the one who had been gently shaking her awake. There was barely enough light to see her by; the sun wasn't up yet.

"Our wardens are eager to get back to Redcliffe and Arl Eamon," Leliana said.

Bethana allowed herself one more sigh but got up without further complaint. Sure enough when she peeked outside, Alistair had already put on his armor and packed up his tent. He paced anxiously at the edge of camp until Elissa sent her mabari to distract him as the rest of them finished their own packing. They were on their way by the time the sun breached the sky.


End file.
